


Sparking a Yellow Flash

by Bookaholic346



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen, Namikaze Clan, Original Character(s), Team Tobirama
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-10
Updated: 2015-10-18
Packaged: 2018-04-25 16:40:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 28,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4968436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bookaholic346/pseuds/Bookaholic346
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before the Sandaime and his friends ran Konoha, they were stupid little genin just like everyone else. A fic telling the story of the early days of Konoha, and how the first generation of students who went though the ninja academy grew up to change things radically.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Academy Days

**Author's Note:**

> This is yet another story I'm switching over from Fanfiction.net to here, and I've revised it a little (minor proofreading) from it's original posting. I've merged chapters together when posting here as well; this first chapter is actually a combination of the first eight posted on fanfiction.net, and I'll probably continue to merge the chapters for a while.
> 
> In other news, I feel like I should throw the warning out there that the main character in this story is a Namikaze OC growing up in the same generation as the Sandaime. Due to the fact that there aren't a lot of named characters from this time period in canon, there will probably be a lot of OC action in this fic. I do my best to work in as many canon characters as possible, as that is kind of the point of writing fanfiction, in my opinion, but it's kind of unavoidable considering that from that time period only Tobirama's team and Danzo's team are named in canon. As my OC grows up, more characters will become available to work in the story, so if you really don't like so many OCs, it would be wonderful if you could stick around until that happens.
> 
> On a side note, Biwako is gonna get a lot of love in this fic, which kind of pleases me immensely. She barely got any screen time in canon, but she seemed kind of awesome. Who wouldn't want to give her a bit more love?

“Oi! Move it Namikaze!”

Only a few minutes into the school day, and he was already eating dirt. Brilliant. The blonde haired boy sat up, groaning a little as he brushed dirt off the pale green shortened yukata he wore. It was brand new, having been sewn by his mother to celebrate his acceptance into the Konoha Shinobi Academy. He would be the first of his immediate family to attend the school, and, ever the proud mother, Shouko Namikaze wanted her son to wear something brand new and respectable for his first day.

And now the white hem of the yukata was stained by mud. At least his pants, a dark olive green, were too dark to show the dirt.

“You know, if you weren’t so quiet, they wouldn’t push you around like that.” A wry voice spoke up from behind him.

The boy whirled around and scowled. “Just because I prefer reading to jumping in mud puddles…” He grumbled, “…doesn’t mean that I'm a push over.”

The girl rolled her eyes and brushed a lock of short brown hair behind her ear, grinning at the blonde boy. “Of course not.” She said tartly. “But it’s not because you’re a bookworm that you’re a push over, it’s because you’re a mouse who only speaks in whispers.”

“I do not!” The boy hissed at her, flushing red. “I can be loud… when I want to be…”

The brown haired girl in the green and white kimono just continued to stare at him flatly, unimpressed. The boy wilted under her gaze.

“Whatever…” He muttered. “I bet I’ll beat them in every test, anyway.”

At that the girl burst out laughed, and took a step forward to help him brush off some of the dirt that he missed on his shoulder. “Don’t be sore.” She told him sternly. “Besides, I’m pretty sure that our paper tests aren’t going to be the only thing on our report cards here. In order to get good grades, you’re going to have to win a few practice spars in taijustsu class too.”

The blonde’s face fell, reliving all of his dismal attempts at learning how to fight during family training sessions. His father was constantly disappointed at the lack of results from his bookish toothpick of a son, and the boy had a feeling that he was going to continue to disappoint him for a while, even though he was going to the Academy and getting a proper education now.

“Come on, let’s go in!” The girl tugged at his sleeve. “No time like the present to start, right?”

The boy looked a little sceptically at the door to the school, which his ‘attackers’ had just disappeared through. “Uh… maybe later… you know... after I work up the nerve... I've still got time until the bell...”

A sharp burn of pain felt through the sleeve of his yukata made him yelp. “Biwako!” The blonde wailed. “Why did you pinch me?!”

Biwako glared at him. “No reason.” She sniffed. “I just suspected that you were succumbing to the deadly ‘Baby no Jutsu’, and the only way to stop that technique from turning the sufferer into a whiny little baby is to pinch them. You should thank me. I just saved your life Hisato.”

Hisato stared at her grumpily, muttering something about ‘unwanted childhood friends’ being ‘mean’. She just raised her eyebrows at him.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that…” Her eyes narrowed. “It kinda looks like I didn’t quite manage to dispel the justu... hang on, let me try again!” She lunged for him, hands clawed, but the blonde boy had had enough, darting out of her reach and stumbling through the doorway of the newly minted ninja academy.

Biwako huffed a lock of dark hair out of her face and rolled her eyes once again. “Stupid.” She muttered, following the boy into the building.

* * *

 

Hisato Namikaze’s day only got worse from there. It wasn’t that school wasn’t enjoyable. On the contrary, he found being able to spend all day learning about things that he’d only been able to glean sporadic knowledge from the books in the clan library very enjoyable. The teachers seemed to know what they were talking about, and they seemed more than happy to explain concepts whenever somebody asked a question. He got to sit next to Biwako all day, and was therefore able to use her as a sort of meat shield in order to avoid talking to people he didn’t really want to talk to. She glared at him every time he hid behind her and buried his nose in one of his textbooks, highly unamused, but she never called him out on it.

No, it wasn’t the classroom that Hisato found unenjoyable. It was the practice yards.

Keeping to himself was quite possible within a classroom. All he had to was keep his head down and not speak unless asked a direct question by the teacher. He had hoped that taijutsu lessons would be able to be dealt with in much the same way. He was wrong. Almost immediately, the teachers started drilling them in the newly decided upon Konoha standard style, teaching them the first Kata at a reasonable pace. If Hisato could keep up, then he would have been able to keep his head down. Unfortunately, he was clumsy and rather unco-ordinated. His clan katas, which he had been taught since he first started to walk, confused his movements and he ended up making quite a few basic errors over and over. He was forced to endure as one of the teachers fixed his stances over and over again as kids stifled giggles around him. His face was bright red by the end of the lesson, and even Biwako sensed that now was not a good time to tease him.

“It’s okay.” She murmured to him as they took their seats back in the classroom. “No one does it perfectly on the first day. Did you see me fall flat on my butt?”

“Sarutobi did it perfectly.” Hisato said sullenly, flashing a look to the dark haired boy sitting on the opposite side of the room, surrounded by his new admirers. It was only the first day, and it was already clear who were the geniuses of the class and who were just average. Hisato was average. He knew that before he started, and he thought he was okay with that. Somehow it still stung to see Mr-Perfect-Sarutobi get everything right all the time.

“Don’t compare yourself to him.” Biwako said stiffly. “He’s not perfect either.”

Hisato just fixed her with a disbelieving look. “Oh yeah, name one thing he’s not good at.” He dared the girl.

Biwako’s confident look faltered. “Um…” She glanced at the laughing boy across the classroom. “Well… I think he’s a little arrogant, if you ask me.”

Hisato’s eyes narrowed. “Really.” He said flatly.

Biwako nodded. “He thinks he can do anything if he puts his mind to it. He doesn’t understand the need for hard work.”

“Sounds to me like he’s just confident.” Hisato huffed. “And why wouldn’t he be? The guy is a genius.”

Biwako just sighed and gave up, leaving him to wallow in his jealousy by himself.

* * *

 

Months passed, spring turned into summer as they took advantage of the wonderful weather for practical field training, like camping in the woods or learning how to set up traps. Hisato rather liked trap making, he had a good knack for ninja wire and using it in interesting ways. Camping wasn’t so nice. Something bit him on their first camping trip, and he spent the whole weekend miserable until Biwako took pity on him and gave him one of her medical ointments to smooth over his irritated skin.

“You’re so lucky that my mother doesn’t notice when I steal her medicinal supplies.” She hissed at him.

He just smiled gratefully at her and whispered back. “Have I ever mentioned how convenient it is that your mother works in your clan’s pharmacy?” He gave her back the ointment with almost reverent care. “Because I feel like I should mention that more.”

Biwako just rolled her eyes and took back the ointment.

Summer turned into autumn, which turned into winter, and suddenly they were only going out into the great outdoors sparingly, instead spending most of their time cooped up in class. Hisato found this turn of events infinitely better. Sure, they still had to go outside for the odd rain or snow exercise, and taijutsu class was never put on hold, but at least there weren’t an ungodly amount of camping trips to put up with anymore. He could just stay in the nice, comfy classroom and do his work with nothing to bother him.

It was nice.

Then winter waned, and suddenly spring was upon them again, and Hisato was handed a slip of paper that made his heart stop in dread.

Class-rankings.

Really, he shouldn’t be upset. He was decidedly average. His paper tests all showed that he was quite intelligent, settling him nicely into the upper quarter of the class on that front. His grades for trap setting were superb, gaining him a number three ranking in the class for the subject. Unfortunately his taijustsu grades were in the lower half of the class, and his shuriken and kunai work wasn’t much better. What made taking this slip of paper home so nerve-racking was that he knew that his father wouldn’t look twice at _paper test_ results, and he would turn his nose up at trap setting. His Ninjutsu and chakra control grades were a bit above average, so hopefully that would save him from the full force of his father’s disappointment though. Hisato hoped, anyway.

His overall class ranking was 32nd out of 68 students. Not bad, but not actually very good either. Hisato just sighed, folded the slip of paper and tucked it into his yukata. His plan was to show it to his mother first, who would probably see his success in trap setting for what it was and give him a little praise. Then he would have to show it to his father and get chewed out once again for his dismal fighting abilities.

“How did you do?” Biwako asked brightly from her seat next to him.

Hisato grinned weakly. “Rank 32.” He replied. “You?”

“24th.” Biwako grinned. “My chakra control rank really boosted me up there.”

Hisato sighed in envy. Biwako was easily one of the most controlled when it came to chakra in the class. She and another girl, Koharu, had fought tooth and nail for first place in chakra control all year, with the ever present Hiruzen Sarutobi bringing up the rear in a close third place.

“I got first place in chakra control, in case you were wondering.” Her eyes glittered in pride, and Hisato couldn’t help but grin back, pleased with her success. “I beat Koharu in the last test!”

“I knew you could do it.” Hisato grinned. “Wanna go get dango to celebrate?”

“You bet!”

* * *

 

“Again!”

Hisato picked himself up out of the dirt and rearranged his arms and legs into the resting stance of the sea-spray style. His arms were positioned loosely in front of his chest, waiting for the strike coming towards him. He knew even before contact was made that the stance was no good. He was too tired to really stand his ground anymore.

“Ooof!” He’d managed to sidestep the first of his father’s blows, but had failed to defend against the hard blow to his stomach. He fell to the ground once again, clutching his middle and breathing heavily.

“Again!”

It took him more than a few moments to pick himself up again. His knees were shaking, and his chest burned as he gasped for breath. His eyes stung too, but he didn’t dare go ahead and cry; the consequences for him would be much harsher if he did so. He settled himself into the resting stance of his family’s taijutsu style once again and tried to slow down his thrumming heartbeat, forcing himself to pay attention.

He ducked the first sweeping blow, dropping into a roll backwards and bouncing back to his feet. His father lunged again, but this time Hisato sidestepped, pushing his father’s arm away. He tried to twist it up and around, like he was supposed to, but the older male was too big and strong compared to his stick thin child body, and his fingers simply scrabbled at his sleeve a little, barely gaining him any momentum. His father kicked out and swept Hisato’s legs from under him before he even had a chance to react, and he was painfully reacquainting himself with the dirt once again.

“Again!”

Hisato felt dizzy. That last fall had been a bit too hard, and he’d been unable to stop his head from making painful contact with the ground. He’d been trained to fall properly, protecting the weak spots on his body in a tangle of cushioning limbs, but it hadn’t worked out this time.

“I… I can’t…” He wheezed. “Please… Father… I…”

“AGAIN!”

Hisato held back a whimper and lurched to his feet, swaying slightly as he clumsily took up his stance.

“Honey!”

Hisato flinched, bracing for the blow that never came. His father was distracted for the moment by his mother’s call from the back porch. He used the precious few moments that he was distracted to gulp a few lungfuls of air in, trying to recover from his fall.

“Shouko.” His father sounded annoyed. He dared not look up to see if the expression on his face matched the tone of his voice. “We’re sparring, please don’t interrupt.”

“Hisato’s had enough now.” Shouko said firmly. “You two have been at it for over an hour. Dinner is almost ready anyway.”

There was a long moment of silence while Hisato prayed. Then finally, a sigh. “Fine.” Hisato looked up to look at his father through the yellow strands of hair that made up his spiky bangs. His father looked less than pleased, but at least he didn’t look fierce anymore. “Go inside and clean up. This isn’t over. You _will_ pick up your taijutsu grades.” His expression was sharp. Hisato decided to cut his losses and go for the easy escape. Not trusting himself to not say anything stupid, he just bowed low to his father to thank him for the ‘friendly’ spar and scurried back to the house.

His mother’s finger’s brushed the top of his head in a comforting pat as he passed, but he dared not stop. He hurried into the house and retreated to the bathroom to wash off the layer of dirt and make a bad attempt to disinfect the various cuts all over his body. He tried not to think about dinner and what a tense atmosphere that would bring. He just grimly concentrated on the bandages, winding them around his body like it was the most fascinating task in the world.

* * *

 

“He means well.” Shouko Namikaze ran her hand over her son’s head, ruffling his downy yellow locks lightly.

Hisato wriggled down deeper under the covers, squirming a little in delight over his mother’s attention. She was the passive, quiet sort, just like him, and as a result she tended to keep her distance from people. “I know Mother.” He said quietly. “He’s strict so that I don’t get myself killed when I start going on missions.”

His mother’s smile wavered a little, and she pulled the blankets up to his chin. “Yes. That’s right.”

“I just wish… he wasn’t so… harsh…” Hisato confessed, thinking back on that afternoon’s beating.

“He’s under a lot of pressure from the clan head.” Shouko told him, “He shouldn’t be taking it out on you. I’ll talk to him.”

“Grandfather’s putting him under pressure?” Hisato frowned. “Why?”

“Your father is only a third son.” His mother reminded him. “Yet he’s still the son of the head. He’s worried about appearing weak in the eyes of the clan. You and your brother are part of that.”

“Oh.”

“Our clan may only be a little less than fifty strong, but make no mistake; we are just as proud as any of the bigger clans.” She shrugged. “Your father is anxious to uphold that family pride.”

“I see.”

Finally, he did. It wasn’t just that his father wanted to train him up so that he would survive the shinobi life, his father wanted strong children so that his personal legacy would uphold the family name. Talented children meant that Father’s standing in the clan would increase. Yuuji was every bit the talented son that his father wanted. A perfect first son. He was immensely talented in the clan arts, using the sea-spray taijutsu style like he was made for it and throwing around the clan’s various water and wind jutsu like, well… water. Hisato, on the other hand, knew he was a bitter disappointment. He liked reading better than fighting. He was utterly useless at the clan’s taijutsu, being too scrawny to pull off the style that utilised making an opponent move the way you wanted at close quarters, and he had next to no affinity for water jutsu, only really getting results when he tried the wind jutsu in his family’s arsenal. As a second son, he was hardly worth mentioning.

“Is Father embarrassed by me?” His question was hesitant, but he felt like he needed to ask.

“Of course he isn’t! Why would you ask that?” His mother’s words were exactly what he expected, after all, what kind of parent would be openly embarrassed by their child? It was cruel. However, her voice was hollow. She was telling him what he wanted to hear, not the truth.

Hisato decided to let it go and wished his mother goodnight.

* * *

 

He is seven years old and feeling more than a little bitter.

“Why do they get to graduate early?” He whined to Biwako, his eyes still fixed on one of the empty seats across the classroom. “They’re not _that_ much better than the rest of us!”

“We probably won’t be stuck here too much longer either.” Biwako reminded him. “It’s not that big a deal. Stop being a baby.” She shuffled her notes around on the top of her desk, going over the complicated diagrams one more time. Recently she had started taking extracurricular classes in order to train as a medic, and she studied almost constantly in order to keep up. “Now that Kumo has joined the war, they’ve started granting early graduations all over, trying to replace numbers.”

“I know that.” Hisato grumbled. “But did you hear who got assigned to be their jonin sensei?!”

Biwako looked up from her notes in interest. “Who?” She asked curiously.

“The Hokage’s brother, Tobirama Senju-sama!” Hisato exclaimed. “Isn’t that so unfair?!”

“Hmmmm…” Biwako’s attention had drifted back to her notes. “Maybe?”

“Ugh.” Hisato let his head hit the desk. “I don’t know why I try, you only listen to every second word I say even at the best of times.”

“That’s because only every second word you say is ever of interest to me.” Biwako said dryly. “Now stop moaning. If you want to graduate early like Hiruzen and the others, you’d best start to work hard. Maybe if you take the top spot now that Hiruzen isn’t here, they might promote you to genin.”

“Stop making fun of me.” Hisato scowled. “You and I both know that Danzo’s going to be top now that Hiruzen isn’t here. And if it isn’t him it will be Kagami. And if it isn’t Kagami then it'll be you.”

“Oh hush.” Biwako waved a hand at him. “Pessimist. Besides, I’m not that good.”

Hisato just stared blankly at his best friend, wondering if she really thought that she wasn’t one of the most talented students of their year. Knowing Biwako, then yes, she did think that. Things had changed in the two years that they’d spent at the academy already. He had worked hard and risen to 16th place. She had risen to 7th, and that was before Hiruzen, Koharu and Homura had graduated early.

“Whatever.” He laid his head down on the desktop. “I don’t care.”

Biwako just patted his arm gently. “Don’t worry.” She said kindly. “You’ll get there Hisato. I know you will.”

“Whatever.” He repeated, turning his face away.

* * *

 

“I’m so proud of you, Yuuji!”

It was the fifth time his father had said that tonight.

It was a special family dinner tonight. His mother had slaved away in the kitchen for hours making all of his brother’s favourite foods. Why? Well… his brother had been promoted.

“Chunin at age eleven!” His Father boasted from the head of the table. “You’re the youngest in the clan so far!”

Promotions in Konoha were still a bit of a sketchy system. For the children who were young enough to start their ninja career through the Ninja Academy, everything was straight forward. They start as Academy students until graduation, upon which they are assigned genin teams with a teacher, or assigned to the general genin pool. After a certain amount of missions were completed under the supervision of their sensei, the genin are then allowed to be considered by the Hokage for promotion to chunin. Once promoted to chunin, they would be assigned a permanent team to work with until their squad leader considers them ready for recommendation for promotion to jonin.

Unfortunately, when the village was founded, there were hundreds of shinobi ready for active service that now had to be fitted into the new system, and that made things difficult. Upon joining the Leaf, clans put up their most worthy shinobi in order to test them for Jonin status. There was a strict criteria, but it wasn’t unattainable. Most of those that weren't made Jonin and were already at the age where they were taking missions applied for chunin rank. There wasn’t enough time to test those all of the applicants who wanted to be chunin, so it fell to the head of each new clan of Konoha to decide who out of their ninja would attain the rank. Those that were left over that had already started their shinobi careers were granted the rank of genin and shuffled into a loose cell based organisation that Tobirama Senju called the Genin corps. Yuuji was eight by the time that the Academy was opened, and he had already started taking missions on behalf of the clan by the time that they joined the village, so he was granted the title of genin upon their arrival at their new home. He was one of the youngest to be granted the rank of genin right off the bat, something that their father had been immensely proud of, and now he had done it again, becoming chunin only three years later.

Meanwhile Hisato was still a measly Academy student, not even a real ninja yet. It was no wonder that his father had totally ignored his existence for the duration of the evening thus far. There was no point in bringing up the fact that he was now a student within the top twenty ranking of his class, his father wouldn’t be very impressed with that either, considering that the best and brightest of their year, the prodigy of the Sarutobi clan, had graduated and made genin rank over six months ago.

No. The only thing that his father would be impressed with was actions and promotions, not test scores. He tried not to feel bitter as his parents gushed over his older brother. Yuuji sat on his father’s right hand side, posture straight as a senbon and his dark blonde hair neatly combed back into a loose ponytail, unlike Hisato, who slouched and couldn’t get his shaggy bright yellow mop to lie flat if he tried.

It was hard not to start drawing comparisons between himself and his brother now that he had started noticing the blatant differences between them. Yuuji was stocky and strong, a natural master of the sea-spray style. He wasn’t fully grown yet, but it was obvious that he’d be the carbon copy of their father once he was; a typical Namikaze man, sans the auburn hair colouring that most in the clan had. Their mother had passed down her blonde hair to both of her boys, but while Yuuji’s hair was sandy and discreet, a good natural colouring for a shinobi, Hisato’s was a bright blonde, something that made him rather stand out in a crowd. Hisato was also a stick; tall and bony for his age as well as quick and agile, but his lack of strength made those qualities next to useless. The only thing that Hisato really shared with his brother was their father’s hazel eyes; a mixture of blue, green and brown.

Watching as his mother heaped another helping of Yuuji’s favourite vegetables into his bowl, Hisato felt very distant from his family. Now he was two steps behind them all: his father was a jonin, his mother and elder brother were both Chunin. He wasn’t even a ninja yet.

Hisato muttered something about how he was full and quietly excused himself from the table, leaving the happy family to their celebration. The only one that noticed him leaving was Shouko, who frowned at him in concern but nevertheless granted him permission to leave the table and retreat to his room.

Hisato tried not to feel hurt by that.

* * *

 

The war was over. They had won.

Except they hadn’t. That’s what Hisato realised as he stood beside his mother with the rest of the Namikaze clan, watching the new Hokage conduct the funeral for his predecessor. Dimly he wondered what it was like, having to conduct the service at your own brother’s funeral. Tobirama Senju looked as solemn as stone as he spoke. He looked brittle, like there was only a thin veneer painted over his skin hiding his grief from the world, and it was cracking. Hisato wasn’t the only one that could see that the new Hokage was hurting though. Genin team 7 hovered nearby their jonin sensei, worry written all over their faces. It was hard to feel jealous of Hiruzen and the others now. They looked more than a little lost, half torn between their own grief for the village’s first leader and their desperate worry for what could arguably be called the most important adult in their lives right now. Hisato wondered if Tobirama-sama would continue to train them, now that he had duties as the Second Hokage. He hoped so; Hiruzen, Koharu and Homura deserved to be able to keep their sensei.

At eight years old, Hisato knew that he wasn’t the most worldly person. Nor was he the most wise. He simply knew how to think, and there was a nagging thought that was going round and round in his head ever since the news of Hashirama's death had made it back to the village.

“Why are we fighting?” He whispered to himself.

It was the thought that kept popping back up.

He was a toddler when Konoha was founded. His clan moved to the village a month before he turned four, just in time to meet Biwako and her family as the Nara clan moved to the village following the advice of the Akimichi clan. He barely remembered the bloody period of almost constant fighting before the villages were founded, and as such the Great Shinobi war was his first true brush with conflict. The short, but harsh, war had barely touched his life, seeing as none of his immediate family had died (although a couple of cousins had lost their lives), but the grim atmosphere that had enveloped the village from the time that war was declared onward was enough to make him nervous. He had been under the impression that forming Shinobi villages was supposed to be the remedy to all of the bloody fighting in the world, not become a catalyst for conflict on an even greater scale. Was it really so wrong to hope that people could put aside centuries of war and decide to work together now?

Apparently it was. People from Lightning country evidently could not get along with those from Wind country, who in turn could not get along with those from Water country, who could not get along with Earth country, who definitely could not get along with those from Fire country, who didn’t get along with those from Lightning country. No one liked each other, and they all relished the opportunity to stab each other in the back. It was disgusting. The First Hokage had hoped that he was ushering in a new age of peaceful co-operation and mutual protection. How wrong he had been. Hisato now saw that there was a long road ahead of them before they looked into the face of true peace.

“Not that I’m probably going to live long enough to see the end of that road.” He muttered darkly to himself again, watching as the Second Hokage finally finished his speech, the rest of the funeral attendees politely not noticing the fact that his voice cracked as he made his final farewell to his brother.

The road ahead was a long one, Hisato had realised that now. Any idiot could see it. He only hoped that it wasn't endless.

 


	2. Graduation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another compilation of chapters, this time the original chapters nine through twelve :)

“Daiki, Biwako, Kagami, Torifu, Junko, Hisato, Danzo, Keichi, Yuu.” Fumi-sensei called out, “Report to classroom four after I dismiss you today, understood?”

Hisato sat bolt upright in his chair and shot a surprised look at Biwako, his equally surprised neighbour. Hesitating only a little as they got over their shock, the two of them chorused acknowledgement of their sensei’s orders along with the rest of the children that he’d singled out. Sitting back in his chair and all but tuning out the rest of their teacher’s lecture, Hisato looked around at the group that Fumi-sensei had named. All of them were reasonably good students, but they weren’t exclusively the top students. If Hisato had to guess, none of them were ranked below the 20th mark. He himself was now sitting comfortably at twelfth place, while Biwako was in sixth. He wondered what was going on. Why had they been picked out?

There was very little time for him to ponder why it was that they had been called out though, because all too soon their teacher had finished speaking and was letting them go for the day. Hisato just stared blankly at the vacant podium at the front of the classroom for a few moments after their teacher left, mind turning over rapidly inside his skull.

A sharp poke to his side made him hiss in pain and turn to Biwako with a scowl, who was already standing, eyebrows raised at him in her signature unimpressed look. How an eight-year-old girl could mimic the exact look of exasperation that his mother used on him whenever he did something naughty he had _no_ idea.

“Are you coming or not?” She asked bluntly, flicking her brown pony tail over her shoulder and tucking a hand onto her hip.

No one did bossy quite like Biwako. She had attitude. At least, that’s what most of the adults said. Sometimes they said it like it was a good thing, usually tacking on something about how cute she was. Sometimes they said it with a scowl and a huff of exasperation. Hisato just knew that his friend was very, very good at making other people feel stupid and getting her own way.

“Yeah, I’m coming.” Hisato sighed and stood, shoving his textbook and pencils into his bag in one long sweep of his desk. Biwako scowled at the mess that he was making in his school bag, but she just sighed and turned to lead the way out of the classroom. Hisato heaved his bag onto his shoulder and meekly followed.

Classroom four was two doors down from their classroom. Usually it was the classroom used for extra-curricular lessons, like Biwako’s medic classes and things like advanced trap making workshops (Hisato had been to a couple of those, but he didn’t dare go to too many lest his father find out and demand answers as to why he was wasting his time learning more about infernal traps when he could be spending his time perfecting his clan jutsu.) but nothing was scheduled for today. He and Biwako just shuffled into the classroom and took seats in a corner, settling in to wait for whatever it was that they had been summoned for. They weren’t the first ones there. There were a couple of older kids from other classes and one small boy from the year below them there already. Together he and Biwako watched as the kids from their own year and several more older kids filtered into the classroom and took seats. By the time that the regular school day was well and truly over, nearly thirty children filled the room.

Finally, a chunin entered the room. It wasn’t one of the teachers that Hisato recognised, and by the narrowing of Biwako’s eyes she didn’t know who he was either.

“Right, shut up brats.” The man up the front snapped, slapping the pile of papers that he was carrying down onto the podium. His eyes were sharp, with a reddish tinge that made Hisato automatically think of the sharingan even if his iris was missing the tomoe that usually made up the Uchiha clan dojutsu. “I’m Junpei Yuhi, and I’m a chunin administration worker of the Nidaime’s.”

Hisato sat up straighter in his chair, looking down at the chunin with interest. If he worked directly for the Hokage, something big was going on here, and Hisato didn’t want to miss a single word that came out of his mouth next.

“As I’m sure you all know already, the war is officially over now.” Yuhi continued. “We won, but we also lost quite a bit. One of our biggest problems is that our Shinobi population is at far too low a level for us to take on all the missions that the village needs to survive. To remedy this, the Nidaime has ordered a mass early graduation test in order to enlist some new blood into the forces and ease the strain that we’re all under.” The man’s sharp eyes roamed around the room. “Are you all following me?”

Realisation had dawned upon Hisato, and he turned to Biwako in glee. “They’re giving us a chance to graduate early!” He whispered eagerly. Excited whispers had popped up all over the room as the rest of the children came to the same conclusion as Hiasto.

Seeing that everyone clearly knew where he was coming from, Junpei Yuhi continued his little speech. “Your teachers have nominated you to take part in the graduation exam.” He told the room. “You don’t have to take the exam. If you do not feel ready to start your career as a genin yet, feel free to leave once I’ve finished speaking. For those of you who want the chance to sit the early exam, you’ll stay behind. The exam will only take an hour, so we’ll be administering it right here and now.” His eyes roamed around the room. “The exam consists of a half hour written test, a taijustu spar, kunai and shuriken accuracy tests and a demonstration of the three standard ninjutsu by each student. If you think that you’re up to the challenge, stay in your seats. I’ll pass out the papers in five minutes time after those that want to go home do so.” He nodded at the classroom of children. “Right. You have five minutes to decide if you want to take the test, starting… now.”

Hisato immediately turned to Biwako. “Are you going to take the exam?”

“Duh.” Biwako said tartly. “Of course I am. Are you?”

Hisato shot her an incredulous look. “Yeah.”

She grinned at him. “Good luck.”

He grinned right back at her. “You too.”

* * *

 

Hisato stared at the gleaming head band resting in his hands, tracing the engraved symbol pressed into the shiny metal with his thumb. It was a stylised leaf, a symbol of Konohagakure, and the mark that singled him out as an official ninja of Konoha’s shinobi forces. The forehead protector was his. He’d done it. He wasn’t a student anymore, he was a genin. He couldn’t wait to inform his father. The time for lagging behind the rest of his family was over. He was now on the path to becoming their equal.

“You passed too then?” Hisato looked up to see Biwako slide into the seat next to him, a huge smile on her face and a blue strip of cloth gripped tightly in her right hand. She waved her own hitai-ate at him with glee, the polished metal throwing the last light of the setting sun from outside the window into his eyes.

“Yeah.” Hisato held up his own Hitai-ate, a stupid grin on his face. “It was touch and go during the spar for a while, but the paper test was easy, I hit the target dead on during the accuracy tests and my ninjutsu were nothing to sniff at.”

Biwako sighed. “I don’t think I did too well in the spar either.” She admitted. “But I’m pretty sure that my three ninjutsu were flawless.”

“It doesn’t matter now.” Hisato told her. “We’ve graduated. No more tests. No more school!”

“No more school.” Biwako repeated softly. She was now staring out of the window, a sad look slowly creeping across her face. In the space of a few minutes she had gone from manically happy to melancholic.

_Girls_. Hisato rolled his eyes.

It wasn’t long before all of the examinations were complete, and those that passed were all gathered once again in classroom four. Their number had shrunk from thirty to nineteen, four children having decided not to sit the test and the rest unfortunately missing the mark. Kagami entered last and took a seat next to Danzo just in time to pay attention to the re-entry of Junpei Yuhi, who made his way back to the podium, this time with a small smile on his face for the group.

“Congratulations.” He told them. “You’re all now genin of the Leaf from today on. You’ll report back to this classroom at nine tomorrow morning for team assignments, and after that you’ll meet your jonin sensei, who will be in charge of your education from this point on. Go home. Get some rest. You all did great today.” He nodded at them all. “Dismissed.”

“Dango?” Biwako asked Hisato as they stood up to leave.

“You bet.” Finally he had something worth celebrating. There was still some time yet before he had to be home for dinner, and for once he didn't really worry about his father's anger should he be late. Surely the news that he had graduated early would grant him a free pass to celebrate with a friend tonight, right?

* * *

 

“What's that?”

Hisato tugged his blonde bangs further down his face. “Nothing.” He told Biwako as she slid into the seat next to him. “I tripped. Are you excited for team assignments?” He grinned at her as she pulled a face of utter dread.

“I couldn't eat breakfast this morning!” She confessed, rocking back in her chair. “What if I don't know my team mates? It's possible, considering that only seven out of our class were promoted.”

Hisato just waved a hand at her. “Don't worry about it.” He said firmly. “Try to be optimistic: we might end up on the same team!”

Biwako raised an eyebrow at him. “Ew. How is that being optimistic?” She said, nose scrunching up in disgust.

“Hey!”

“Just kidding.”

Biwako laughed as she leaned over the desk, resting her chin on her hands to stare at the front of the room, watching out for whatever teacher was supposed to be coming to give them their team assignments. Hisato tried not to look at her, determined not to let her see how much it worried him that it was likely that they would be separated for this next step in their ninja careers. Biwako was a top student, he was average at best really: his father had reminded him of that fact last night.

_I bet she's assigned to the same team as Danzo._ He thought to himself. _Or Kagami. Those two were the best in class._

_Not counting Hiruzen._

Danzo still got an exceedingly sour look on his face every time someone brought up the Sarutobi heir and his talents. It was plain to everyone with eyes in their heads that Danzo was bitter that he never once beat Hiruzen for top spot before he graduated early. Even though Hisato was sure that Danzo would probably be grouped with Biwako and he did want to stay with her, he found himself hoping to avoid having the dour Shimura on his own team. Danzo was far too competitive for his liking. No doubt he would make everything a contest just so that he could rub the fact that he was better in his face over and over. Hisato already knew that Danzo was better, and he got his inadequacies rubbed in his face enough at home, he didn't want to have to deal with it at training too.

_Kagami is a decent sort though..._ Hisato mused. He didn't really know much about the Uchiha other than the fact that he was just as talented a ninja as the rest of his clan, but he didn't look uptight or snooty like Danzo did.

Hazel eyes roamed the classroom, casually observing those that had already arrived. The older kids and the little Hyuuga boy from the year below them were of almost no interest to him. It was possible that he might end up on a team with any of them, but there was no sense in speculating now; he knew next to nothing about any of them. He did, however, know a thing or too about the kids from his own class. Torifu Akimichi was sitting in the corner with a bag of rice crackers, eyes darting around the room a little wildly. His best friend was Yuu Yamanaka, but the smaller boy hadn't passed the exam yesterday and was back in normal classes today. Hisato felt sorry for them both, being separated like that. As unlikely as it was that he would be in the same team as Biwako, at least they were both genin and would still see each other now and then. Of their class, two out of the nine given the chance to graduate early had failed, Yuu and a rather brash civilian born girl called Junko.

Hisato looked around the room, searching for the other two graduates from his class he hadn't seen yet today. His eyes caught Keichi Namiashi's for a few seconds, and the solemn looking boy blinked his narrow eyes in acknowledgement, giving an affirming nod of camaraderie to Hisato before he looked away again. He looked happy talking to his cousin from the year above in the seat next to him.

A flash of silver finally pinpointed the last of his graduating classmates. Daiki Hatake was sitting at the back of the class, very much absorbed in trying to build some sort of deadly looking structure out of a couple of shuriken on the desktop in front of him. He was another boy that Hisato hoped wasn't on the same team as him. Daiki was a bit crazy, when all was said and done. He liked playing with sharp and pointy things too much even for a ninja in training, and he always wore long sleeves and trousers, even in the middle of summer.

“Alright, shut up midgets so that I can give out the team assignments and get back to my _real_ job.”

Hisato blinked in surprise and turned his attention back to the teacher's podium at the front of the room which Junpei Yuhi was leaning against, looking a little pissed off that he'd had to commit to even more time 'babysitting' after yesterday's exam.

“Teams one to seven are still active, as well as team eleven.” Junpei explained. “So the new team eight is...”

Hisato's whole body locked up as he listened to Junpei rattled off the names. The first names going into teams eight and nine meant nothing to him, as they were all older students, and the only thing interesting about team ten was that Keichi was assigned to it, along with the little Hyuuga boy.

“...Team Twelve, Danzo Shimura, Torifu Akimichi and Kagami Uchiha....”

All of the breath came out of Hisato in one surprised gasp and he stared at Biwako, a little puzzled. He was so sure that she'd be paired with both or either of Kagami or Danzo, but they'd been teamed up with Torifu of all people.

“...Team Fifteen, Biwako Nara, Hisato Namikaze, Daiki Hatake...”

Biwako jammed her elbow into his side excitedly. “We're on the same team!” She squealed as quietly as she could into his ear.

Hisato just felt a little numb. There was no way that he could be so lucky as to land on the same team as his budding medical genius best friend, right? He felt like he'd used up all his luck for at least the next couple of years all at once. A little too shocked to actually reply verbally to Biwako's excited hissing in the seat next to him, he just smiled at her and then twisted around in his seat to take another look at Daiki Hatake, his other team mate.

Daiki was already looking down from the back of the classroom at the two of them. He raised his hand in a jaunty wave when he caught Hisato looking, then turned his attention back to his precarious stack of shuriken, still engrossed in his task.

“He's weird.” Biwako had noticed who he was looking at.

“He's our team mate.” Hisato reminded her. Biwako was blunt. It was one of the things that he liked about her, but sometimes she forgot that not everyone else wanted to know her honest opinion about things. Biwako seemed to have no functional system of tact available to her yet. Hisato was faintly hoping she'd grow out of it so he could stop having to apologise on her behalf all the time.

“I know.” Biwako said tartly. “I didn't say that I didn't like him. I just said he was weird.”

Hisato just stared at her. “You're doing it again; saying mean things without noticing.”

Biwako shook her head. “I meant it as a compliment.” She said. “He'll fit in with us. We're weird too.”

Hisato choked back a laugh. “Yeah. Okay. Whatever.” Should he be insulted or flattered? As was always the case with his best friend, Hisato had no freaking clue.

* * *

 

Team fifteen was picked up on the dot of ten o'clock by a rather plain looking man with light brown hair dressed in the standard jonin uniform for Konoha, sans the clunky armour that most shinobi wore when they left the village on missions. There was almost nothing notable about their new sensei's appearance apart from the red strip of cloth sporting a clan marking tied as a belt around his hips. He was also abnormally quiet. Short of calling out for them when he arrived at the Academy to pick them up, the man had not said anything else. Unnerved by the man's silence, the three of them simply trailed quietly after him as he led them out of the Academy and through the village.

Biwako had tensed the moment that they had fixed eyes on their new teacher for the first time, and she hadn't relaxed since. Her eyes were fixed firmly on the jonin's back, her attention unwavering. She was watching him. It was a nervous habit of hers to keep her eyes on anything that scared her or made her feel uncomfortable. Hisato knew it made her feel better to have eyes on the source of her unease, it meant that she could see anything unfortunate coming rather than being blind-sided by it.

Daiki, on the other hand, seemed relaxed. In contrast to Biwako's alert and stiff posture, the Hatake was walking rather loosely, with one hand resting between the overlap in his white short yukata. Hisato suspected that this casual stance might be an act though. Even knowing only a little about his other team mate, he knew that Daiki probably had some sort of hidden weapon holster on the inside of his yukata, and was simply fingering whatever blade he had stashed there now for extra comfort. Hisato understood the feeling. He was fingering his own wrist holsters for the two kunai hidden under his pale green sleeves as they walked too.

Their teacher took them right through the village and out into the outer areas where most of the main training grounds were located. Hisato wasn't that familiar with the area, considering that he'd only ever trained in the Academy practice yards or within the Namikaze clan compound. The man that they were following though seemed to know exactly where he was going, making his way through the rough paths that snaked around the training yards like he came here all the time.

_He probably does come here all the time._ Hisato told himself. _A lot of the older ninja hang out at the training grounds rather than clan compounds so that they can practice with team mates that aren't in their respective clans._

Finally the man took a sharp right between a hedge and entered a small clearing marked by a little wooden sign as 'Training Ground 5'. He strode right to the centre of the round clearing and turned to face them abruptly, face smooth and unreadable.

There was a long moment of silence as their teacher looked at them, and they looked back of their teacher.

“I'm Toru,” He said quietly. “Of the Kurama clan.” He nodded at them, tapping a finger against the side of his leg. “I'll be your Jonin sensei, and your team captain, until you get promoted to chunin.” His eyes narrowed. “ _If_ you pass my test.”

“Test?!” Biwako blurted. “What do you mean? We already passed the graduation exam!”

“That doesn't mean I have to teach you anything.” Toru told her. “I'm a jonin. I'm busy. I don't plan to waste my time on a bunch of kids that don't have what it takes to be ninja yet.”

“That's not fair! You're our teacher, you have to teach us!” Biwako argued. “The Hokage...”

“The Nidaime tested his own team, just like I'm going to test you.” Toru-sensei said calmly. “No genin passes without going through a jonin sensei's test.”

Hisato felt his heart sink with every word that the man said. There was yet _another_ test that he had to pass in order to be a proper ninja of the Leaf? It was beyond unfair. How were they supposed to be prepared for a test that they never saw coming? He was sure that he was going to fail. The universe was always doing this to him, letting something good happen just so that he was lulled into a false sense of security so he would be thoroughly tripped up when the rug was inevitably pulled out from under him.

“What's the test?” Daiki piped up, eyes fixed firmly on the jonin before them. “When do we start?”

The corner of Toru's mouth twitched. “Technically, I'm supposed to be giving you the test tomorrow.” He said. “Today is supposed to be the day that I introduce myself to you and we get to know one another.” He regarded the three of them standing there like they were buzzing flies rather than students. “But I think I'd rather do the test stuff first. There's no point in learning any of your names if you're just going to fail.”

Well... wasn't that just... irksome... Hisato stiffened, frowning at the jonin. He was looking down on them, and he didn't like that. He knew he wasn't the most talented young ninja out there, but how dare this guy imply that he was useless! He was perfectly capable of becoming a full fledged ninja!

Biwako was openly scowling at the man in front of them, Hisato had noticed, and she had gone very quiet. Biwako going quiet was always something to be worried about, because something bad always followed. Daiki was glaring at their new sensei too, looking decidedly unimpressed with his attitude. His hand was still tucked inside his yukata, and Hisato suspected that he was fighting the urge to pull out whatever he had hidden in there to stab their teacher with.

“So what's the test?” Biwako asked through gritted teeth.

Their sensei did not miss the noticeable hostility that all three of them were now radiating at him. His mouth quirked into a small smile. “What do you know about my clan?” He asked instead.

Hisato felt his own hostility fade a little in confusion over the sudden change in topic. “The Kurama Clan are experts in advanced genjutsu.” He supplied the information automatically, prompted by his lifetime of reading on subjects that most children would gloss over, preferring to read about cool jutsu rather than dusty summaries on clans.

Toru-sensei turned to look at him with a subtle expression of interest. Flushing pink, Hisato realised that his quick answer was the first thing he had ever said to his new teacher. The man had probably started to wonder about the fact that he hadn't said a word up until now, worrying whether the academy had chucked him a defective mute student or something.

_Yeah, he was probably thinking something like that. Biwako always says I should speak up more..._

“Very good.” Whatever the man had thought about his silence earlier, he chose to keep quiet on it now.

“Why is that important?” Daiki wanted to know.

Their teacher's mouth twitched again in amusement. “Ah... well, I'm mean, but not that mean. Take it as a hint.” He paused. “Now... the test.” He locked eyes with all three of them. “It's a race.” He said simply. “You have to catch me before the sun reaches it's peak in the sky.”

Heart dropping, Hisato kissed his chances of passing this test goodbye. He had no chance of beating anyone in a physical test.

“We just have to catch you?” Biwako repeated suspiciously.

“Like a game of tag.” Toru said. “Easy, right?”

She just narrowed her eyes at him. “There's a catch, isn't there?”

He snorted, and suddenly his hands were moving, whizzing through seals faster than Hisato thought possibly. Their sensei's image flickered, then he was gone, leaving only empty grass where he once stood.

“There's _always_ a catch.” Toru Kurama's voice boomed around them, disembodied and distorted, making it impossible to tell from where he was speaking.

“Damn it!” Daiki wailed. “He's hiding from us using _genjutsu_.”

“So that's what the hint was about....” Hisato mused quietly.

“It's not tag.” Biwako said seriously. “It's hide and seek.”

And things were getting worse. Not only was their teacher now invisible, Hisato was now forced to acknowledge the fact that their surroundings were getting hazier. Wisps of smoky cloud surrounded them as a thick illusionary mist enveloped the training field. Pretty soon, all that Hisato could see were the two team mates that stood nearby him, both watching the mist as intently as him.

“Kai!” Biwako and Hisato both turned to look at Daiki, who was glaring around at the fog, pissed off that nothing had happened when he tried to dispel the genjutsu.

“Kurama genjutsu is famous for being next to impossible to break.” Hisato murmured to the two of them. “Every now and then someone is born into the family with the ability to make their illusions real too. Some even say that most of the Kurama can make a few very basic illusions real as well, even if they don't have the main Kekkai genkai.”

“Well that's just perfect.” Daiki huffed a lock of silver hair out of his eyes and frowned. “I guess... good luck to you both?” He looked at them quizzingly.

Biwako nodded at them both. “Good luck...” She echoed.

Hisato tried to croak out something along the lines of 'Good luck', but all that really came out was an embarrassing garbled noise. He was far too nervous now to enunciate actual words. Daiki didn't look like he cared that his team mate was verbally challenged though, he just nodded at them one last time before disappearing into the mist. Biwako understood him perfectly from her years of practice trying to understand him in his clumsy moments. She placed a comforting hand on his shoulder in support.

“Don't freak out.” She said quietly. “You'll do just fine. I know you will.” She retracted her hand and took a single step away, looking more than a little nervous herself. “Let's do this!” she pumped her fist into the sky, flashed a grin at Hisato and ran out into the fog, leaving him standing there, rooted to the spot and alone.

“Well... what the hell do I do now?” He muttered to himself.

 


	3. New Genin

Toru flopped onto the couch, feeling like he had aged a few years in a single morning. It wasn't that he was _tired_ , per se, it was more the fact that he was mentally exhausted. When he was summoned by the Hokage a little under a week ago and told of his new assignment of teaching he readily accepted, foolishly thinking that he had a good idea of what he was getting himself into. After all, how was taking on a team of midget ninja much different to helping train the little kids of the clan? He had two younger sisters, and since his father was dead and his mother was a civilian who had married into the clan, Toru had been the one to take them through the clan katas most of the time.

One morning in the company of his little twits had set him straight. Training genin was vastly different to training sisters.

“Something the matter Kurama-san?”

Toru cracked open an eyelid to stare up at the bemused face of one Arisa Yamanaka. Her golden brown hair done up in her clan's customary long ponytail swayed as she tilted her head to the side, attention fixed on him.

“I'm fine, Yamanaka-san.” Toru said gruffly, grudgingly pushing himself upright so that he was sitting on the couch properly. He eyed the woman warily. The Yamanaka were famous for their mind tricks, and it was for that reason that most people apart from the members of the Akimichi and the Nara clans kept their distance. They may all be one village now, had even fought a war together, but reputations were hard to shake off, and the Yamanaka had an unnerving one to say the least.

“Arisa is fine.” the woman smiled wider, waving her hand at him. She plonked down into the seat next to him, a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “There are too many Yamanaka floating around for me to insist upon formality. For all I know you could have been addressing my uncle.”

Toru frowned at her, already feeling a little tired of the attention of this strange Kunoichi. Hadn't she heard of personal space? If she crept any closer to him on this couch he was probably going to end up sticking a kunai in her out of nervous habit.

“Is your uncle around here now?” He asked.

“No. He hates the jounin lounge. He never comes here.” Arisa told him.

“Then why on earth would I be addressing your uncle?!” Toru sighed in exasperation.

The Yamanaka girl just blinked at him. “Arisa.” She said firmly, ignoring his exclamation.

Toru just resigned himself to his fate. For some reason this Yamanaka woman had taken an interest in him, and he was just going to have to endure it. Hopefully she wouldn't take her mind games too far; he wasn't in the mood right now for verbal sparring.

“Fine.” He said. “What can I do for you, _Arisa-san?_ ”

The woman pouted, like she expected him to leave off the honorific too, but luckily she let it go. “I was wondering what had a guy like you sighing like an old man, Kurama-san.”

Toru just blinked at her for a minute. Was this woman... concerned? About him? How strange. “It's not a big deal.” he reassured the woman. “I just finished meeting my genin team for the first time.”

“Oh!” Arisa grinned and sat back, clapping her hands like she'd just got her mits on a juicy bit of gossip. “So it was a _genin_ induced sigh.” She giggled outright. “Are the little fiends driving you up the wall yet?”

Toru rolled his eyes. “I've only known them four hours, and I'm already counting the days until their chunin promotion.” He said honestly.

“So they passed the last genin test?” Arisa asked.

Toru nodded. “Yeah.... unfortunately...”

“How did they go?”

“It was a nightmare to start off. I put the lot of them under a genjutsu. The three of them split up to try and fight me on their own at first. Then the Nara girl figured out that they were just going to keep running in circles by themselves, so she hit the two boys over the head and dragged them into working together to break the illusion.” Toru scowled. “I should have failed the lot of them. The Hatake is over confident in his own abilities, the Nara has something to prove and the Namikaze is too timid to pitch his own ideas.”

“Yet... you still passed them...?” Arisa looked at him with a piercing gaze. She wanted to know his reasoning, and Toru vaguely knew why. He needed to vocalise his reasons in order to reaffirm to himself exactly what he saw in those midgets this morning. She was doing her job as a Yamanaka well. Why the whole clan felt the need to monitor the mental health of all their colleges Toru had no idea, but it was proving rather useful now.

“The Hatake is willing to risk his own neck for his team mates, the Nara instinctively knows what she needs to do to back up the boys and the Namikaze desperately wants to fit in. They're not a unit yet, but their damn close for a new genin team; especially since it looks like the Nara and the Namikaze are childhood friends.” He said. “Besides, I couldn't really fail them when they did work together to break the genjutsu before my time-limit. It wouldn't be fair.”He huffed in a annoyance.

“The way I see it, you can look at this two ways.” Arisa said lightly, leaning back on the coach, hands behind her head. “You can hate every minute of teaching them and make yourself miserable as you count down the time until you can ditch them and get back to _real_ missions.” She paused. “ _Or_ you can take this paid vacation for the opportunity it is and polish that team until it shines. They may be annoying little shits now, but give them a few months and they'll mellow out.” She grinned at him. “Plus, there's the added bonus that you get to set your midgets upon anyone that annoys you, which I always thought was the best part.” She giggled and jumped to her feet. “Speaking of...” She flashed him a grin, tossing her honey coloured hair over her shoulder. “I should probably go collect them before they wear my poor little brother out. He so graciously _volunteered_ to put them through teamwork drills today.” She cackled evilly, and Toru started to wonder just what kind of Yamanaka he had stumbled across today. She was definitely giving off T &I vibes right now. Everyone knew that interrogator-nin were crackpots at the best of times.

“Uh... okay...” Toru regarded her warily. “...thanks... for the advice... uh... Arisa-san.”

The Kunoichi fluttered her fingers at him, tossed her hair over her shoulder _again_ , and skipped off out of the Jonin lounge, looking like she had the world at her fingertips. Toru felt a shiver run up his spine.

_Her poor little brother._ He winced. _Her poor genin team...._

Toru just stared after the strange Yamanaka for a long moment. Despite the fact that she was quite possibly one of the scariest, prettiest girls that he had ever met, she did actually give him some good advice. Getting a genin team didn't have to be the end of the world. Yes, it was basically a bullshit babysitting mission, and yes, teaching was very, very tedious, but it didn't have to be that way. At the moment he had three midget ninja who didn't know how to work together, who hadn't been in a real fight before and who had no idea what the realities of shinobi life were. He could be lazy and let them figure it out on their own.... or he could take them on as a proper project.

Hmmm... a project.... that was a good way of looking at it. Now all he had to do was figure out exactly how he was going to do this. Gotta keep them on their toes, after all....

* * *

 

“Right.” Toru-sensei nodded at them. “At least you're all punctual.”

Daiki mumbled something incoherent and fell off the severed log he was dozing on, Hisato startled awake in panic and Biwako simply turned over in her sleep. She was a Nara: they could nap through anything.

“Sensei...” Daiki grumbled as he sat up. “It's _six thirty in the morning_.”

“I know.” Toru-sensei smirked. “You lot better get used to it too, because we're going to be having training at this time every morning from now on.” He sounded almost gleeful about it. Hisato decided right then and there that their new sensei was evil.

“But... why?!” Daiki demanded. He was now fully awake and pouting, much like Hisato. Biwako still hadn't roused herself from her slumber. Hisato realised that he would probably have to be the one to wake her soon unless she wanted the unpleasant experience of an annoyed Jonin having to do it.

Toru-sensei's look was one of mock confusion. “Why?” He repeated innocently. “How else are we going to fit in stamina training and sparring everyday before breakfast if we don't meet up at this time?”

Daiki and Hisato looked at him in horror. He wanted to do _what_ everyday before breakfast?!

“That way we can start bright and early after breakfast by taking one of the first D-rank missions of the day!” Toru-sensei continued in a horribly jovial tone. “Once we polish off a couple of those, we'll stop for lunch and spend the rest of the afternoon doing team work exercises!”

Hisato groaned and buried his head in his hands. _My new sensei is insane._ He thought numbly. _And my life as I know it is over.... good to know._

“Right! Let's get started!” Toru-sensei pumped a fist in the air, grinning evilly. “Oh... and someone wake up Biwako and tell her the bad news... I don't really want to start whipping out the water jutsu this early in the morning.”

Hisato scrambled to wake Biwako up. As much as she hated him shaking her out of her naps, he reckoned that she'd hate a water bullet jutsu to the face even less.

* * *

 

By mid-morning, Hisato could safely say that D-ranks _sucked_. His first proper mission as a ninja... and it was to help an old lady clean out her storeroom. Hisato had no idea how one little old lady could possibly have a storeroom that was that musty and filled with crap considering that the village had only been founded less than ten years ago, but she did. It took them half the morning to clean it out and by the time that they were done they were almost ready to drop, considering that their sensei had made them run around their training ground for an hour that morning before he even considered letting them start sparring.

Hisato just wanted to curl up like Biwako always did and take a nap. But _nooooo!_ When Toru-sensei reported their D-rank completed to the mission desk, he had the gall to ask _for another one_. It took them another two hours to weed that woman's garden, and by that point all of them were dead on their feet.

“Well... I think we'll stop for the morning here and have some lunch.” Toru-sensei said casually as they walked up to the mission desk to report in.

Daiki heaved a huge sigh of relief. Biwako whimpered in joy. Hisato just did his best not to fall over.

“I know a place.” Toru-sensei told them. “My treat.”

Toru-sensei's 'place' as it turned out was a small barbecue restaurant at the edge of the growing commercial distract. The place didn't look very old, the building showed signs of only being constucted in the past year or so. Hisato guessed that the place was probably set up by one of the new civilian families that had settled in Konoha after being displaced by the war.

“Isn't barbecue a bit heavy for lunch?” Biwako muttered as Toru-sensei exchanged greetings with a smiling woman wearing an apron.

“This place needs a better name.” Daiki said, eyeing the gaudily painted sign identifying the restaurant as 'The Flaming Pig'.

“I can hear every word you're saying, midgets.” Toru-sensei called out dryly, his back still to them. “I'm treating you, try to look grateful or something.”

All three of them sheepishly shut up.

* * *

 

When Toru-sensei said 'team work exercises' that morning, Hisato immediately thought of all the lame group work that they were forced through at the Academy. Trust exercises were good and all, but he didn't really fancy an afternoon of catching his team mates as they fell or leading each other around blindfolded. Toru-sensei, had very different plans.

“I know I said 'team work exercises',” He said, settling himself down on a tree stump as they sat cross-legged in front of him. “But I don't think it's what you're expecting.”

“No random toothpick tower building challenges then?” Daiki said sarcastically.

“Please tell me we're not doing riddles or puzzles.” Biwako said darkly. “Every one always looks at the Nara whenever there's puzzles involved. I'm sick of it.”

Toru-sensei snorted. “Toothpick tower building?” He scoffed. “What are they doing at the Academy?”

“Trying to make things a little more 'civilian friendly'.” Daiki said. “I heard one of the teachers say that the Nidaime is trying to make it easier for the civilian born to ease into the shinobi life.”

Their teacher pulled a face. “Well... I suppose that makes sense.” He said. “And it's not an entirely stupid idea. We can't rely on the clans filling up the corps forever. We need the fresh blood.”

“Why?” Hisato asked, curious. Like most of the children from shinobi clans, he'd always rolled his eyes at the civilian born recruits at the Academy. They slowed the whole group down as the teachers had to explain concepts to them that the clan kids had known pretty much from birth.

Toru-sensei's sharp grey eyes flickered to him. “Because if this village is going to become more than just a random alliance of clans, we need independent ninja flowing into our ranks.” He explained. “It connects us all with the civilians living here, making it easier for them to relate to us and us to relate to them. That's not to mention the fact that we just came out of a war. Our forces are depleted right now and we need to give everyone willing to pick up a kunai a chance.”

“So... it's to foster good relations with the civilians and to increase our pool of recruits?” Biwako said thoughtfully. “That does sound pretty smart, actually.”

“If there's one thing to say about the Nidaime, it's that he's smart.” Toru-sensei told her. “Hashirama-sama may have founded this village, but it's Tobirama-sama that's kept it from self-destructing.” The tone of respect in their sensei's voice was something knew that Hisato had never heard before. He took note of that: the Nidaime was a shinobi that their teacher, a Jonin and powerful ninja in his own right, respected. It wasn't that surprising, considering that the whole village greatly respected their second Hokage, but somehow the seal of approval from his teacher mattered all the more to him. If Toru-sensei thought that the Nidaime was worthy of respect, then Hisato would respect him too.

“So if we're not doing those kinds of team work exercises, what exactly are we doing?” Daiki prompted their teacher back to the key topic of conversation.

“We're going to learn to work as a shinobi team.” Toru-sensei said simply.

The three of them just looked at him blankly. “So... dopey team work exercises then?” Biwako said with a sigh.

“No.” Toru-sensei waved a hand at them. “What we're going to do is figure out how to fight together. By the time that we leave the village on a proper mission, not all that D-rank crap, you three are going to know each other's strengths and weaknesses inside out. You're going to have standard battle formations to fall back on. You're going to know what to do when you are forced to fight in battles both alongside me and when you've been separated from me. You're also going to know what to do when you're hopelessly outclassed and need to retreat without tripping over yourselves.” He paused. “In short, I'm going to teach you how to take your skills and use them to function together as one unit. Does that sound like 'dopey' team work exercises to you?” He smirked at Biwako as she reddened slightly.

Daiki leaned slightly forward, grinning eagerly. “What are we doing first Sensei?” His dark grey eyes sparkled with enthusiasm.

“First, we're going to play a little game...” Toru-sensei grinned and pulled a scroll out of his equipment pouch. He laid it out on the ground and opened it up, swiping his thumb over the storage seal until it glowed white. When the light disappeared a mountain of wooden shuriken lay in front of them. “... I like to call: 'Find the blind spot'.”

Biwako picked up one of the wooden shuriken with a frown. “The blind spot of what?” She wanted to know.

“Each other.” Toru-sensei grinned. “I want you to throw these at each other until you figure out your team mates' blind spots.”

“Huh?” Hisato paled as he looked at the pile of shuriken. “You want us to try and hit each other?”

“Hence why we're working with wooden shuriken instead of live ones.” Toru-sensei said in amusement. “For this to work you need to seriously aim at each other like you're going for the kill, but I hardly want you to actually murder each other.”

Hisato winced, but said nothing. Wooden shuriken still hurt when they made contact. Even if they didn't break the skin they still left nasty bruises. At least he could say that he was decent at dodging. He could move pretty fast when he needed to.

Toru-sensei clapped his hands. “Right. Get to work. The point of this exercise is to discover your team mates' blind spots and dodging abilities so that you know what to cover for when in a fight with _real_ shuriken flying around.”

_That... actually makes a lot of sense_... Hisato thought as he followed Biwako and Daiki's lead and picked up a handful of the training weapons. _Better Biwako and Daiki find my blind spots for me now than an enemy later on._

“Right! Have at it!” Toru-sensei grinned. “Go!”

The three of them sprung into action.

* * *

 

“So how are things going with your team?” A flicker of movement startled Hisato out of his thoughts and he looked up to meet a pair of hazel eyes.

“Nii-san!” Hisato blurted, his book sliding off his lap and onto the grass at his feet. “I didn't know you were back!”

Yuuji Namikaze settled himself on the wooden veranda next to Hisato with a small smile. “I got in an hour ago. Thought I'd come and see how you were doing. I heard you graduated while I was away on my escort mission?”

“Yeah.” Hisato grinned at his brother. “Biwako and I both got offered early graduation two weeks ago.”

Yuuji smiled wider. “Good for you little bro.” He reached out and gently mussed up Hisato's hair. “So... what's it like having a Jonin-sensei? Mother said that you passed the final genin test. Must be nice not to have to report to the genin corps.”

Hisato remembered that his brother never had much patience for the genin corps while he was in it. The corps originally started out as the loose organisation to hold all the lower level ninja upon the inception of the village, but now that graduates from the Academy were starting to filter through the system the corps was morphing into a dead end assignment. It was now the place that you were sent if you failed the final test. It was much harder these days to get a promotion to chunin out of the genin corps than it was if you were part of a genin team under a jonin. Yuuji was young enough that some of that difficulty to get promoted was starting to be felt around the time that he managed to up his rank to chunin.

“It's... interesting...” Hisato pulled a face. “Toru-sensei is a bit of a slave driver.”

Yuuji raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“We meet up everyday at half six in the morning.” Hisato explained. “He makes us spar and stuff before breakfast.”

Yuuji laughed. “I kind of like this guy already!”

Hisato scowled. “You only like him because you get to sleep in while I don't.”

Yuuji shrugged. “Maybe.” He teased. “Anyway, it sounds like this guy is taking your training seriously, which is good.”

He had to frown at that. “Why wouldn't sensei take our training seriously?” He wanted to know.

“I don't hang out with a lot of jonin, but I do hear them talking amongst themselves.” Yuuji confessed. “Most jonin think that taking on a genin team is a major pain. Some of them try to coast by doing the bare minimum. I was worried you might get a sensei like that.” He grimaced. “It's those jonin who end up getting their students killed the first time they tackle real missions.”

“Oh.” Hisato stared down at his book, still nestled in the grass at his feet. “Well... Toru-sensei isn't like that, so don't worry.” The six thirty starts didn't seem so bad anymore. Things could be so much worse if Toru-sensei was one of those coasting types. He really wanted to live past his first C-rank.

“What other stuff do you do?” Yuuji wanted to know.

“D-ranks.” Hisato said darkly.

His brother just laughed. “Having fun weeding gardens and chasing lost pets?” He asked.

“Boring!” Hisato announced. “Why can't these people do their own stupid chores?”

Yuuji shrugged. “Hey, it's all part of being a genin brat, we all had to do it.”

“It's only been two weeks and I'm sick of it.” Hisato moaned.

“It gets better.” Yuuji reassured him. “In a few months your sensei will decide you're ready for a C-rank and then you'll miss those boring chores.”

“Not likely.” Hisato snorted.

“At least you get to eat real food and sleep in a proper bed every night while doing D-ranks.” Yuuji pointed out. “C-ranks are mostly escort and courier missions. That means days, even weeks on the road, sleeping in the dirt and eating ration bars.”

That didn't sound particularly appealing either. Hisato still hated camping. The thought of having to live on the road didn't sound very exciting at all. He'd also overheard the ninja of the clan complaining about escort missions before, now that he thought about it. General consensus was that they were boring missions guarding weak and whining clients.

“Ugh.” Hisato sighed. “Why isn't being a ninja more glamorous?”

“It is.” Yuuji told him. “But only for the jonin. The rest of us grunts get stuck with the boring stuff.”

“Father thinks that you might make jonin soon.” Hisato said quietly, scuffing the tip of his foot over the grass.

Yuuji sighed. “I know. But he's wrong. I'm barely thirteen. It's not going to happen until I'm fifteen at the least, even if my mission record is pretty good.” He paused. “Father is getting ahead of himself.” His grim tone told Hisato that that was all Yuuji wanted to talk about on the matter.

Hisato kept his thoughts to himself. He knew that his brother was right, and that Father was overestimating Yuuji's potential. It hadn't been that long since he'd been promoted to chunin after all. But Hisato also knew that Yuuji was _under_ estimating himself. These days it wasn't uncommon for his older brother to get tapped for B-ranked missions, even though he still worked C-ranks as his bread and butter. Everyone knew that only upper level chunin got sent on B-ranks, so the higher ups must be expecting good things out of Yuuji already.

“Mother's probably got dinner nearly ready, are you coming inside?” Yuuji asked.

Hisato blinked, shaking himself out of his thoughts about his brother and any potential promotions. “Uh... yeah... hang on.” He bent down and fished his book out of the grass. Then he tucked it under his arm and stood.

“Come on, let's go see if she needs help setting out the chopsticks or something.” Yuuji slung an arm around Hisato's shoulders as they re-entered the house together.


	4. The Wake-up Call

 Before he knew it, an odd sort of brotherhood (Biwako would kill him for calling it that though: she was a firm believer in Girl Power) had sprung up between the three of them. Biwako had always been his friend, in fact for quite some time she had been verging on becoming an annoying sister that wouldn't go away, but now she was always there. She was the one that covered for his taijutsu clumsiness in group fighting exercises by devising clever plans. She was the one who was always there to patch up his scrapes whenever he got knocked around. She nagged him and Daiki like a second mother, admonishing them into eating vegetables when they ate together as a group. She stopped them both from making stupid mistakes on their D-ranks, like intercepting Hisato before he accidentally uprooted a patch of daisies, thinking they were weeds, or wisely taking over from Daiki whenever the boy was called upon to do cooking of any kind.

Biwako was one thing, but realising that Daiki was now just as important to him kind of threw him for a loop. He had barely spoken to Daiki back in the Academy. The Hatake boy was smart and skilled, far superior to Hisato's meagre battle skills. Yet Daiki always wallowed around 15th place in the class rankings. He deliberately scored worse to maintain that ranking, flunking tests and throwing spars with other students. It rubbed Hisato the wrong way then. He struggled and fought through every test, every spar, trying to improve his ranking, yet Daiki sat back and effortlessly maintained 15th place like it was nothing. It was like he was mocking Hisato's efforts by not even trying.

Then there was the fact that the Hatake boy had a reputation for being eccentric. He spent eighty percent of his life climbing things like a monkey. He hid an ungodly amount of weaponry on his person, even for a ninja (Toru-sensei once made them disarm themselves completely for an exercise. Hisato was carrying six concealed kunai on his person, Biwako was carrying three kunai plus a hidden pocket of fifteen senbon inside her left sleeve. Daiki was carrying sixteen hidden kunai, two hidden holsters containing twelve shuriken apiece, another hidden holster of twenty senbon – some poisoned, some not – and a short sword concealed at the small of his back by his obi). It was impossible to tell what he was thinking half the time because he tended to poke fun at everything. As you might expect, that kind of attitude did not get on particularly well with Biwako's sharp tongue, and the two often ended up nitpicking at each other for hours, leaving Hisato wishing that he could trade his team mates in for new ones at times.

Despite all that could be seen as annoying about the boy though, Hisato did actually consider him a close friend. Daiki could have taken advantage of his weak taijutsu to trounce him every time that they sparred, but he didn't. He held back so that Hisato could actually stay in the fight long enough to work on the flow of his fighting and steadily improve. He didn't have to do that, as Hisato knew it had to be tiring to deliberately allow a fight to drag on. Daiki was also good for brightening up the chores that they had to do by cleverly turning it into a game or a competition. They even managed to rope Biwako into some of their crazy bets at times. The best part about Daiki though was that the other boy always took him seriously. He never once gave Hisato any indication that he thought he wasn't good enough to be on their team, in fact he seemed to value his input, prodding him into speaking up and coughing up ideas in group discussions. He seemed to trust in Hisato's book knowledge too. If he had a question about something theoretical he sometimes ran it past Hisato before he took it to Toru-sensei, just in case he had read about it somewhere before. It was nice to feel needed, and Daiki did it without Hisato feeling like he was just pitying him.

As the weeks passed, their team work got snugger. Toru-sensei pushed them past their limits in team exercises. He never just handed them team formations on a silver platter, they had to experiment and come up with them on their own. He helped by ruthlessly picking apart all of their plans and constructs, forcing them to adapt and improve their creations until they were up to scratch in a real fight. Before they knew it they had a good formation developed. Biwako hung back as a support nin with her medic skills and her shadow binding technique. Daiki was their scout and melee fighter. Hisato just managed to slot into place as their mid-range fighter with his improving taijutsu and clan water and wind ninjutsu skills. It was a good formation.

“...but not a great one.” Toru-sensei said quietly, setting down his cup slowly.

“Huh?” Hisato looked over his own teacup at his teacher in dismay. “You mean it's no good Toru-sensei?” He was crestfallen. They'd slaved for weeks on the formation, tweaking their teamwork until they ran like a well-oiled machine. Toru-sensei had praised their efforts during their last training session. Was he taking that back now?

“Hisato... do you know why I singled you out this afternoon?” Toru-sensei said slowly. His grey eyes were as sharp as ever, and they seemed to bore into Hisato like drills.

Hisato couldn't stop himself from shivering slightly. “Uh.... no... not really...” he said timidly. “Is it about my role in the formation...?” His heart sank. “Am I not good enough to fight with Daiki and Biwako?”

It hurt to say it out loud, but Hisato knew his fear wasn't unfounded. He wasn't that good of a ninja. He was average. Compared to the almost genius skills of his team mates he was _below_ average. He struggled through every training exercise that Toru-sensei had thrown at him. He'd done his best to work on the Sea-Spray taijutsu style as much as he could. He'd worked himself to the bone mastering as many of the clan ninjutsu as possible, and he'd even managed to finally branch out into water jutsu instead of just relying on wind. He really thought that he'd improved enough to keep up. Even his father seemed to faintly approve of his skills these days.

Clearly it was not enough. And Toru-sensei had taken him aside after training to this teashop to tell him so.

“Bluntly put Hisato: yes. At the moment you are not good enough to really fight with your team.” Toru-sensei's reply was cool.

Hisato instantly looked down at the teashop table, allowing his bangs to fall forward and obscure his face from view. His eyes stung, and he definitely did not want his teacher to see him if he actually succumbed to tears in this situation.

“Your taijutsu is clumsy and lacks power.” Toru-sensei continued. “Your ninjutsu skills are stalled at lower ranking techniques. Your position in the group is as mid-range fighter, but that's really for lack of anywhere else to put you. Biwako and Daiki cover for you more than you cover for both of them combined. In a real fight the enemy would mark you down as the weakest link in a heart beat and Biwako and Daiki will kill themselves trying to protect you.”

Hisato was going to ignore the fact that droplets of water were falling onto the table cloth in front of him now.

“Are... are you going to remove me from the team?” His voice shook no matter how hard he fought to keep it from doing so. He'd never been very good at controlling his emotions, yet another mark of a poor shinobi.

“No.” Toru-sensei said calmly. “Hisato. Look at me.”

He frantically dabbed at his eyes with his sleeve before raising his head to meet his sensei's eyes once again. He flinched upon making eye contract, but did not dare look away again. Toru-sensei was wearing his serious business face. It was the face that he always wore whenever he wanted them to pay close attention to whatever he said next.

“Sensei?” Hisato squeaked.

“Hisato. Why are you sabotaging yourself?” Toru-sensei asked.

“Sa...sabotaging...? I don't... I don't know...” He shrunk back, unsure what was going on here. He worked so hard trying to iron out his faults in his ninja skills. He knew he worked harder than Biwako and Daiki. There was no way he would do something so stupid as to sabotage himself!

“You're forcing yourself to train in disciplines that you have no talent for.” Toru-sensei told him flatly. “You invest time and effort into struggling away at skills you will only ever be passable at while neglecting any true talents you do have. Would you not call this sabotage?”

Hisato's mouth dropped open. “I... don't understand.”

Toru-sensei sighed and leaned back in his chair a little. “Hisato, why do you think different clans have different fighting styles?”

Hisato blinked. “Because they have different cultures and backgrounds, as well as different ninjustu specialities.” He said.

“Hmmm... that is true... but you missed the key reason.” Toru-sensei's mouth twitched upward into a ghost of a smile. “It's because it suits them.”

“Huh?”

“Generations ago, when the clans were forming and developing their signature taijutsu styles they weren't thinking about tradition or culture. They were focussing on developing styles of hand to hand combat that would make them most lethal. They tailor made taijutsu to fit their bodies.” Toru-sensei paused, tracing the rim of his teacup with his fingertip. “The advantage of a clan taijutsu style is that most of the clan is related by blood, you see. That means that most of the members have similar body builds. Similar strengths and weaknesses. It means that a taijutsu style honed over the centuries can become something of a deadly masterpiece when in the hands of a person with the build the style was catered for.”

Hisato sagged in his seat. “I know.” He said miserably. “I'm too thin for the Namikaze clan taijutsu. I'm not strong enough to pull off any of the throws or grabs well.” Toru-sensei had pierced deep into the inferiority complex that Hisato had been doing his best to ignore. There was no way that he'd ever be good enough. He just wasn't strong enough to ever be more than passable at the Sea-Spray style, not like Yuuji, to whom it came as naturally as breathing.

“Which brings me back to my original question: why are you sabotaging yourself Hisato?” Toru-sensei asked.

Hisato gulped. “I still don't understand.” He said in distress. “I'm rubbish at taijutsu, but I'm doing my best to-”

Toru-sensei held up a hand, silencing him. “You're certainly trying your hardest to improve in the Sea-Spray style, yes.” He said coolly. “But are you doing your _best_? No.”

Hisato's stomach dropped. “What do you mean I'm not doing my best?” he blurted. “It's hardly my fault that my clan style is unsuited to my body! It makes everything ten times harder! But I'm improving! I know I am! You'll see!”

“Hisato. Stop pretending to be something you're not. Ditch the Sea-Spray style before it gets you killed. Or worse, before it gets your team mates killed.” Toru-sensei said firmly.

“But...! It's _my clan style_!” Hisato said, aghast. “I can't! I can't just drop it!”

“Why not?”

“Because my family would be angry!” Hisato couldn't believe he had to explain this to him. Wasn't Toru-sensei part of a clan too? How could he even suggest doing something so disrespectful as to disregard the fighting style passed down to him by his ancestors? “It's tradition! It would be dishonourable to give it up just because I'm having a little trouble!”

“We are shinobi, since when has honour had any part of what we do?” Toru-sensei pointed out.

“There are lines you don't cross.” Hisato said stubbornly. “It's complicated.”

“It's complicated, huh?” Toru-sensei sighed again. “You know, I don't think it really is. You need to think about it this way. What's worse: losing a little bit of standing in your clan over a fighting style you hate anyway, or falling short in a serious fight and watching your friends die because you didn't have the guts to step up?”

Hisato froze, images flitting through his head of Biwako and Daiki riddled with bloody kunai, lying motionless on the ground. All because he wasn't strong enough. Not good enough to watch their backs. Sometimes he really cursed his over-active imagination.

But what was he supposed to do? The Sea-Spray style was the pride of the Namikaze clan! His father talked about their taijutsu like it was beloved friend rather than a set pattern of movements. Every single bit of praise that Hisato could remember having ever gleaned from him was whenever he reached a new level in the clan style. Could he give that all up? Could he give up his father's love and regard and turn his face from clan tradition to protect his friends?

It was Hisato's own personal nightmare. His father would be furious if he tried to discard the clan taijutsu style. His mother and brother would be disappointed. He'd probably end up alienating himself from the rest of the clan too. Was it worth it risking all that happening to him on the chance that a different taijutsu style would help him stand on a level playing field with Biwako and Daiki?

His lip trembled as he finally turned his attention back to his teacher. Toru-sensei was patiently waiting for him to sort things out in his head, calmly sipping at his tea. He looked like had had all the time in the world to wait for Hisato's answer.

“Sensei...” Hisato said in a small voice. “How would I even know where to start learning another fighting style?”

Toru-sensei put down his tea cup. “Traditionally, when a student requires extra instruction, they would ask their Sensei to either instruct them as required or help them find a teacher who can.” he said mildly. “So I would suggest you do that.”

Hisato suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. This was one of the most tense moments in Hisato's life so far, and Toru-sensei still hadn't left his dry sense of humour at the door. “Sensei. Would you help me find a new taijutsu style that is better suited to my body's natural build?” He bowed his head for good measure, adding to the formality.

“I would be happy to, Hisato-kun.” Toru-sensei said cheerfully. “From now on, why don't you spend the rest of our afternoons training with me after team work exercises are done and your other team mates tend to their own individual training?”

“You... would do that for me?” Hisato wasn't quite sure what he was feeling, but astonishment was a big part of it. Toru-sensei already gave up most of the day teaching them, and now he was willing to sign himself up for _more_? Just to help him?

“Of course. You are my student.” Toru-sensei said simply. “All you had to do was ask.”

Hisato bit his lip. “I can't believe that you would... sacrifice... _anything_ for someone like _me._ ” He sniffed, feeling a little overwhelmed with it all. “Thank you Toru-sensei.” He bowed his head low again. “I promise I will repay you for this one day.”

A hand under his chin forced his head up, and Hisato looked up to see Toru-sensei smiling at him gently. “Hisato-kun. There is no need to repay me. The bond between shinobi and sensei is one of the strongest in this world. For you, Biwako and Daiki, I would do anything.”

Hisato found himself blinking back tears again. “Thank you Toru-Sensei!”

* * *

 

Toru exhaled heavily as he watched the door to the tea shop shut with a click behind his most troubling student. He'd been dreading having this talk with the boy for quite some time. He should have done it sooner, but he'd foolishly put it off hoping that Hisato would realise for himself that his current course of action was not working for him. He hadn't, so Toru had been forced to enact some tough love.

'Being cruel to be kind', as they say. Toru knew that he could have broken it to the boy gentler. He was painfully aware of Hisato's self-esteem issues, and this approach edged entirely too close to breaking the boy's confidence completely for his liking. However, any softer method of trying to force Hisato away from his clan's fighting arts would likely backfire. Hisato could be enormously stubborn when he wanted to be. The fact that he clung so fiercely to a fighting style that even _he_ realised was unsuited to him was proof of that. No. Toru had to shake him to his core in order to part him with the Namikaze clan style.

And it had worked, thankfully. Hopefully this had served as the wake-up call that Hisato so desperately needed. If this attempt had failed, it likely would have taken tragedy in the field in order to snap Hisato out of it. Toru really wanted to avoid that if possible.

Now all he had to do was convince him to actually branch out into the areas of expertise that Toru knew he could shine in. When he took on this damn team he turned up on day one expecting a budding medical genius, a tracking whiz kid and the next Trapper of Doom. He got his medic-nin and his tracker easy enough, but his trapper seemed almost frightened to even pick up a coil of ninja wire and some exploding tags.

He couldn't wait to see what the kid could do when he went nuts though. His Academy trapping scores were off the charts. The Academy sensei actually had to enact genius protocol when it came to grading him (Genius protocol was a system put in place by the Shodaime after spies succeeded in assassinating a budding genius still attending the Academy during the early stages of the war. Official files of any kids displaying high enough talent in an area to be considered a future threat worth nipping in the bud before they got too dangerous were tagged and carefully edited. From that point on the Academy instructors had to downplay the kid's skill in question so that it seemed like he/she was merely slightly gifted. Hisato was tagged with genius protocol for his trapping ingenuity. Biwako was tagged for her medic-nin training, which went far above and beyond what most academy students attempted. The Sarutobi kid's file was practically dripping with protocol marks. They had to give him to Tobirama early for the kid's own damn protection. Not that he ever came close to beating Hisato in trap construction, Toru noted with glee.) and that was when the kid was only half-arsing it.

Oh yes... Toru couldn't _wait_ until he finally saw what his frightening little midgets could _actually_ do when they put their minds to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With this I'm finally switching to chapters that aren't merged together, as this is the point that the fic turns from drabble-like to serious chapters. I aim for each chapter to be around 3000-4000 words from here on out. I'm trying to munch my way through proofreading the remaining chapters and hope to get this fic up to date as soon as possible :)


	5. Lightning Step

Hisato shifted nervously. Biwako was the first to leave afternoon training, pleading a hospital shift that she had to get to. Her departure pretty much signalled the end of training and Daiki left soon after, explaining that he had plans to train with his older brother. Hisato hadn't told either of them what Toru-sensei had told him yesterday, nor had he told them that he was staying on for extra training after they were done for the day. He had been dreading the moment where he would have to sheepishly explain himself to his friends, but the universe smiled on him and they both left before the situation even became known.

Lucky.

But.... on the other hand.... now he was alone in training ground five with Toru-sensei, shifting from foot to foot nervously and staring down at the ground. When he agreed to do this, he didn't really think it through to this part: the part where he would be alone with his teacher. He would be expected to... speak and stuff. Without Daiki and Biwako to carry the conversation, Hisato suddenly felt painfully awkward.

“Well... it was easier to get rid of your team mates than I thought it would be.” Toru-sensei said lightly. “Shall we get started?”

Hisato squeaked out something that he thought sounded close enough to 'yes' to pass muster.

“Hisato.”

He peered up through his bangs to see Toru-sensei standing in front of him with a rueful smile on his face. “Yes, Sensei?”

“It's just me here.” Toru-sensei said dryly. “You can relax.”

“Yes, Sensei.” Hisato clasped his hands in front of him and sheepishly told himself to get a grip. He _wanted_ these after training sessions. He _wanted_ to be there.

...Maybe.

Toru-sensei sighed. “Why don't you sit down?” He suggested, settling himself down on his usual tree stump that he used. Hisato obediently settled down in front of him, legs crossed and hands on his knees.

“Have you given any thought to what kind of fighting style might suit you?” Toru-sensei asked.

Hisato shifted a little. “Not... really.” He admitted.

“You must know your own strengths and weaknesses in taijutsu though, right?” Toru-sensei prompted. “What have you got?”

Hisato gulped. “Well... I'm no good at grappling or throws... anything that requires a lot of muscle strength. I don't have a lot of stamina either, so extended fights are hard...” He trailed off, darkly thinking about how all of his weaknesses seemed to line up with the strengths that the Sea-Spray style was supposed to promote. Thinking about the issue clearly, Hisato knew now that he'd never be a master at the Namikaze clan style. He just didn't have the muscle mass or power to pull it off.

“And your strengths?” Toru-sensei said.

Hisato blinked. “Uh... I'm okay at dodging, I guess...” He said slowly, racking his brains for things he was actually good at. Not a lot of things were coming to mind, depressingly enough. “I'm pretty fast too... I think.”

“You also have a good body memory and excellent observational skills.” Toru-sensei told him. “Which means you don't have to learn flashy moves that cause a lot of damage. You can be just as deadly with precision hits.”

“Precision hits?” Hisato asked curiously. “Like taking out the heart every single time or something?”

“Kind of.” Toru-sensei tapped a finger on his leg thoughtfully. “More like once we're through with you you'll be able to kill a man by aiming for _veins_ , rather than limbs or organs.”

Hisato's eyes widened. “Is that even possible?” He wanted to know. “You wouldn't even be able to see what you're aiming for, would you?”

“I know a few people that fight that way.” Toru-sensei said seriously. “Medic-nin, mostly. If you know the body inside out you can aim for the kill spots that most people don't even realise they need to protect.”

“I'm not a medic-nin though.” Hisato pointed out, sagging a little in disappointment. “Biwako tried to teach me a little once, but I was useless at it. My control isn't good enough.”

Toru-sensei shrugged. “You don't have to be a medic-nin to learn the human body inside out.” He said. “I'm sure you know a lot more than most people already. I know you read Biwako's textbooks sometimes when you're bored.”

Hisato flushed. “They're interesting...” He muttered. “...and I like reading...”

“Good.” Toru-sensei said. “Instead of sneaking peeks while Biwako has her back turned, I want you to borrow them from her and read them properly. For this to work you need to know human anatomy as well as Biwako does.”

“O...kay...” Hisato said slowly. “So I'm going to learn medic-nin style fighting?” Despite asking him earlier if he had any ideas for a fighting style to try, Hisato now suspected that Toru-sensei had a plan for what to teach him before they even sat down. Maybe even before he took him aside yesterday to tell him to switch things up.

“No. You're going to learn Lightning Step.” Toru-sensei said. “The anatomy stuff is so you know what you're aiming at.”

“Lightning... Step?”

“Yeah, it's a speed based style. Not that common in Konoha, it's a style that a lot favour up in Kumo, but there are a few masters floating around here.” Toru-sensei said. “And I've managed to snag you one of them as a teacher!”

“You're not teaching me sensei?”

“Nope. I use the Kurama clan style of taijutsu. My style has an emphasis on dodging, so it is a lot closer to Lightning Step than Sea-Spray... I can probably help you out with some sparring eventually.” Toru-sensei glanced up at the sky, checking the position of the sun, then he nodded. “We're due to meet up with your new teacher soon, we should probably get moving.”

Hisato felt his mouth drop open slightly. He knew it. His teacher had already figured out what kind of fighting style would suit him before they even sat down to discuss it. Not only that, but he'd already found him a teacher to coach him in said style. Exactly how much effort was Toru-sensei pouring into his extra training? It made him feel even more guilty about taking up his time.

“Coming?” Toru-sensei said in an amused tone.

Hisato looked up to see that while he was brooding about his teacher's foresight the man in question had already stood up and started to walk away. He was halfway across the clearly, smiling slightly as he turned back to look at Hisato, one hand tapping against the side of his leg impatiently. Hisato scrambled to his feet, flushing slightly in embarrassment.

“C...coming Sensei.” He stuttered, tripping over his feet to catch up.

* * *

 

Training ground seven looked like it was empty when they arrived there. Toru-sensei didn't look bothered as they entered though. He just leaned up against the one of three wooden training posts in the clearing to wait. Hisato copied him, trying not to fidget so much that his teacher would be able to tell that his nerves were basically fried by now.

He'd only just gotten used to Toru-sensei, how he was supposed to suddenly start learning from another strange adult? Hisato only hoped that Toru-sensei hadn't bothered anyone who already had a lot to do crammed into the schedules. Surely another jonin wouldn't have the time to take on a student they didn't have to?

_It's probably a chunin that Sensei knows._ Hisato decided.  _A chunin with a lot of time on their hands who doesn't mind tutoring a bit of taijutsu to a genin._

Secretly he hoped the this teacher that Toru-sensei had found for him was somewhat similar to Yuuji. Learning a new fighting style from an older brother type figure would probably be less nerve racking. It might even be fun.

“Ah... I'm late, aren't I?”

“Not at all.”

Hisato looked up and felt his mouth drop open. Standing in front of them now, a small rueful smile on his face and his hands jammed into the pockets of his battered training trousers, was the last man on earth Hisato thought his sensei would have the balls to ask teach him a taijutsu style from scratch. He watched, numb and speechless, as Toru-sensei traded easy greetings with the Nidaime Hokage and assured him that they had not been waiting long.

His brain still wasn't functioning properly when Toru-sensei turned to face him again. “Tobirama-sama is the best Lightning Step fighter in the village, and he's agreed to teach you in the afternoons after our team training from now on.” He explained cheerfully. “Treat him with the same respect you do me, okay?”

Hisato's eyes flicked to the Hokage, who passively watched Toru-sensei talking with a look of slight amusement on his face, then back again to his sensei. He gave a jerky nod to show he understood. As if he could possibly treat the Hokage with any _less_ respect that he did Toru-sensei!!

“Well... have fun!” Toru-sensei learned forward and ruffled his hair, then he took a step back. “See you tomorrow!”

_Poof!_ Hisato blinked as Toru-sensei shunshined away, leaving him staring blankly at the empty spot where his teacher once stood.

_He... left me..._ Hisato thought numbly.  _He totally just up and ditched me._

Hisato twitched and looked back to the Hokage, who was still just standing there with his hands in his pockets and a small smile of amusement on his face.

_He up and ditched me with the **Hokage**._ Hisato realised, his blood starting to pound in his head. 

The utter bastard. Sometimes he really thought that Toru-sensei had only taken the teaching gig in order to torture his students. He seemed to revel in their misery and awkwardness. Hisato felt a little dizzy.

“Breathe, kid.” A soft baritone voice rumbled through the clearing. “I take it he didn't warn you that I would be the one teaching you.”

Hisato shook his head jerkily. He really should open his mouth and speak. It was incredibly disrespectful to reply to the Hokage using only nods and head shakes, but Hisato knew that probably all the noises he could make right now were garbled sounds of distress, so he chose to stay silent rather than embarrass himself further.

The Nidaime's mouth twitched. “I thought Toru's reports were exaggerating how twitchy you are.” He said lightly.

Hisato squeaked. He was making an utter fool of himself in front of the leader of the village and he desperately wanted to make a run for it. The only thing that stopped him doing so was the fact that Toru-sensei would be disappointed in him if he bailed.

That and the Nidaime would be able to instantly catch him the moment he scarpered.

“I don't bite, you know.” The Nidaime said conversationally.

Hisato winced. The Nidaime did not bite. He knew that. There were quite a few stories of other, infinitely more frightening, things the man could do however. That's not to mention the fact that Tobirama was essentially his boss and ruler rolled into one. If he related it to the food chain, Tobirama would be a lion leading the pride. Hisato would probably be some sort of bug. A small bug.

Oh. He was sooooo screwed.

“Uh....” Hisato cleared his throat, trying desperately to hold onto the last remaining scraps of his dignity. There wasn't much left to hold onto. “...I wouldn't think that you would have time to teach another student... Hokage-sama...” Hisato stumbled his way through the inquiry. “...aren't you still... still Sarutobi's team's sensei?”

“Toru and I are doing a bit of a trade.” Tobirama replied easily. “These days my team has to do their D-rank missions without supervision. Toru promised to check up on them every so often for me, as well as include them in your team lessons whenever he's covering genjutsu. As a Kurama, his lessons on that subject will be more thorough than mine anyway.”

That... actually sounded like a pretty fair deal. Tobirama would spare an hour or so every weekday afternoon to teach Hisato katas until he got the hang of it while in exchange the man gained a second pair of eyes to watch out for his own students while he was busy being the Hokage. Toru-sensei was a pretty good negotiator when it came down to it.

Hisato couldn't help but notice that the Hokage called Toru by his first name without a honorific. Considering that Tobirama was the highest ranked ninja in the village, he could probably call people whatever the hell he wanted to, but the Nidaime Hokage had a bit of a reputation for being a little aloof. Hisato dimly remembered that Toru-sensei addressed Tobirama as 'Tobirama-sama', not 'Hokage-sama' or 'Nidaime-sama'. Did that mean that Tobirama and Toru-sensei were friends? If they were, it might make a lot more sense that Toru-sensei went to the freaking _Hokage_ to find Hisato a Lightning Step teacher.

“Toru said that you want to learn Lightning Step in order as a replacement for the clan style you've been using up until now.” Tobirama's voice rumbled through the clearing again, disrupting his chain of thoughts and reminding him that now was not a very good time to go off on elaborate thinking tangents.

“Um... Yes!” Hisato jumped to attention as Tobirama's red eyes seemed to sharpen on him, like he was examining him from the inside out.

“It's a brave thing to do... giving up your family style.” Tobirama said. There was barely any inflection in his voice, making it impossible for Hisato to tell whether the man approved of his actions or not.

“My body type means that I'll never be a master at the Namikaze clan style.” Hisato blurted, praying that this was the right thing to say. “I'll never be able to protect my team if I don't find a style I can use better.”

“Protect your team, huh?” Tobirama's eyes narrowed. “You don't think they can fight well enough for themselves?”

Hisato's eyes widened. “Of course they can!” He exclaimed. “But no one can watch their own back. They watch mine, so I want to be strong enough to watch theirs... that's all...” He trailed off, feeling a little sheepish at the outburst. He hadn't _quite_ yelled at the Hokage, but he hadn't exactly spoken as respectfully as he probably should have either... whoops. He was making the _worst_ first impression.

Tobirama said nothing for a long time, his eyes focussed on Hisato as he squirmed. Hisato didn't dare look away from this intimidating man though. His gut told him that looking away would be the single worst thing that he could do right now. Tobirama was testing him. For what Hisato didn't know, but he just hoped he was doing well enough to pass.

“From now on you'll call me Tobirama-sensei.” The white haired man finally said, nodding firmly. “None of that Hokage-sama kowtowing crap. It's annoying when I'm not wearing the hat, and we have better things to focus on than proper manners.”

Hisato's mouth fell open. “Uh... Yes! Hoka... Tobirama-sensei!”

Tobirama's mouth twitched into a smile again, this time looking amused. “It's going to be difficult, trying to relearn how to fight in a different style. You'll have to unlearn pretty much all the battle instincts that you've committed to your body memory so far and overwrite them with new ones. Are you prepared for that kind of hard work?”

Hisato took a deep breath. That was the whole reason he was here, standing his ground against a kage and trying not to melt into a puddle of nervous goo. He'd made it this far, as if he'd let something as silly as the promise of miserable hard work daunt him now.

“I am, Tobirama-sensei.”

Tobirama's smile widened to a grin, and Hisato caught a glimpse of the man's canines glinting in the sun as he smirked.

“Right. We start now.” Tobirama- _sensei_ said firmly. “First, take me through all of your clan katas that you've learnt so far. I'm not really familiar enough with your family style to know what kind of instincts you're going to be unlearning here.”

“Y...Yes!” Hisato jumped to follow Tobirama-sensei's orders, settling himself into the resting stance for the very first set of the very first kata of the Sea-Spray style.

The afternoon flew on from there.

 


	6. The Difference Between Daiki and Biwako

Something highly suspicious was going on, and Daiki was going to find out what.

Their team had settled down into a nice little routine since the day that they'd graduated. The early morning starts had taken some getting used to, but in the end Daiki adjusted, just like his team mates had. These days it was so ingrained in his routine to rise before the sun that he was getting up that early on weekends too, working in some extra jogging or meditation before breakfast. To say that his parents were surprised was a bit of an understatement. Daiki had never in his entire life been an early riser. They had to send the dogs to drag him out of bed by his ankle every morning when he was attending the Academy, and on the weekends he was a lost cause until lunchtime. His brother just about had a stroke when he strolled in for breakfast at seven the first Sunday he was back from his border patrol. Daiki tried not to take offence. If he sneakily dumped a generous dose of salt into his brother's cup of tea, well... that was entirely co-incidental. They'll never prove anything.

Getting back to the whole team routine though: Daiki _thought_ that they had something solid going. Early morning training, then breakfast (sometimes they ate together, sometimes they wandered home to their respective houses for the meal), a couple of D-rank missions, lunch and then they finished off the day with Toru-sensei either helping them with their teamwork exercises or running them through a lesson on a branch of the shinobi arts that may prove useful to know, like the afternoon that they spent on lock-picking, or learning to walk on water. Afternoon lessons usually took as long as they had to. Sometimes they lasted for barely an hour, sometimes the four of them were in training ground five until dark, but it was only after Toru-sensei completed the afternoon lesson that they were allowed to wander off and do their own individual training. Biwako's hospital shifts were the only exception, considering that those were scheduled ahead of time and could potentially screw things up with the hospital staff if she was late. Like most shinobi, Toru-sensei was a firm believer in the mantra: 'don't piss off the medics', so Biwako pretty much had a get out of jail free card there.

That was the routine. They had stuck to it for the past eight weeks. Daiki saw no reason for any of it to change. There wasn't a need for it. But then it did, subtly, and Daiki was left with a burning curiosity that he knew would have to be sated sooner rather than later.

The difference that Daiki noticed in the ninth week of their training under Toru-sensei was during the afternoons. For the whole week, none of their afternoon lessons ran past three o'clock. That wasn't totally suspicious, it was entirely possible that Toru-sensei just didn't have any time intensive lessons planned for that week.

Then it happened again during the tenth week of training. Every day without fail the lesson was wrapped up before three in the afternoon. Even more suspicious was the fact that Hisato seemed to disappear almost instantly after practice was declared over if they ran too close to three. The dude was starting to seem a bit like Cinderella at midnight. Boom, the clock strikes three, you turn around and Hisato was gone.

Highly suspect.

What could Hisato be doing at three o'clock every afternoon that gave him a free pass on the same level that Biwako's hospital shifts gave her? Daiki tried not to feel miffed that he didn't have any appointments that Toru-sensei was willing to bend the sacred rules of routine for. He was starting to feel left out here.

Of course, the very fact that he never really had concrete plans after every training session did give him a good advantage though. If he had nowhere to be, then it wasn't too difficult to skive off an afternoon of training to, say... tail a team mate.

Speaking of, he really needed to give Hisato and Biwako some quick lessons on how to notice a tail, because they were quite shocking at it. Daiki knew it was probably because he was a tracker, and had more training on tailing a target than either of them, but he couldn't always be around to watch their backs. They really had to learn to pick up when people were spying on them for themselves.

But that was a lesson for later. Right now he was jumping from rooftops and tree branches following Hisato through the village as stealthily as he could. It was a bit of a trouble to keep up, Hisato was moving quite quickly and Daiki couldn't go at full speed for fear of bringing too much attention to himself, but he managed to hang on until they made it to Hisato's destination.

Training ground seven.

Daiki blinked from his perch in a tree overlooking the training ground's clearing. So Hisato was ditching them at three o'clock every afternoon to travel across the village and hang around in a practically identical training field? Weird. Clearly something else was going on here, so Daiki settled himself down on the tree branch to wait.

Daiki always thought he was a pretty good tree dweller. Climbing trees and scaling buildings was like second nature to him now, and balancing on high up perches was as easy as standing on solid ground. So, of course, when the Nidaime Hokage walked into training ground three and greeted Hisato with a friendly half wave, Daiki almost fell out of his tree.

_Hisato_ was meeting up with the _Hokage_ everyday at three o'clock?!

Bullshit.

Daiki pinched himself, sure that he was trapped in some sort of prank genjutsu. Toru-sensei probably caught him tailing Hisato and placed the illusion on him as punishment. Because there was no way that that was really the Hokage down there supervising Hisato as he went through what looked like a basic taijustu kata.

He pinched himself again, in case the first spike of pain wasn't enough to dispel the genjustu.

Nope, Hisato was still down there with the Nidaime.

What. The. Hell?

“Having fun?” A quiet voice rumbled at his ear.

Smooth dude that he was, Daiki shrieked in surprise and tumbled out of the tree, crashing to the ground to land in a sprawled heap in the dirt.

“...Daiki?” Daiki looked up with a groan to see Hisato standing over him, a half-confused, half-concerned (and tiny bit amused) look on his face. “What are you doing here?”

“Um...” Daiki pushed himself up out of the dirt, grasping for an excuse. “I was chasing a cat.” He said stupidly.

Hisato gave him a flat stare. “You... were chasing a cat...?”

Daiki nodded, committed to the bullshit now. “Yeah... slippery little guy... I thought he ran up that tree so I was up there looking for him.”

“Riiight.” Hisato said dryly. “You were up a tree... looking for a cat...”

Daiki stared back unflinchingly. “Um... yeah.”

Hisato didn't say anything, just gazed down at Daiki with an unconvinced look on his face. Daiki managed all of two minutes staring Hisato down before his eyes flickered to the right, over Hisato's shoulder to the smirking face of the Hokage, whose slightly trembling shoulders made it look like the man was tightly suppressing laughter. His eyes flicked back to Hisato.

“So... um... what are you doing here?” he said, hopeful that he might be able to turn his attention away from his own embarrassment.

“Training.” Hisato said simply. “You know... what most people do in training fields.”

“Oh... right...” Daiki trailed off. Trust Hisato to be as evasive as possible. The twerp was doing it on purpose. He had to know that Daiki was dying of curiosity here!

“Daiki. What are you _really_ doing here?” Hisato asked pointedly, arms crossed.

Daiki heaved a sigh of relief. “I wanted to see where you were going every afternoon.” he said huffily. “Okay?”

Hisato pulled a face. “Why didn't you just ask?” he snorted.

Of course Hisato wouldn't get it. Daiki doubted that he'd ever followed anyone for fun before. “That wouldn't be any fun!” He whined. “Spying is so much more fun that just straight up asking. Where's your sense of adventure, Hisato?”

Hisato rolled his eyes. “If you'd done the sensible thing and asked you would have found out without being being scared by Tobirama-sensei's clone into screaming like a little girl and falling out of a tree.” He pointed out.

_Tobirama-sensei?_ Daiki carefully filed that bit of information away.

“Yeah... well... that wasn't part of the plan...” he rubbed at his head, feeling a knot forming from the fall. He grinned sheepishly up at Hisato. “Sorry.”

“It's okay.” Hisato grinned back and offered him a hand. Daiki grabbed it and let Hisato haul him to his feet. He brushed the dirt off his clothes as his eyes flicked back to the Hokage. Hisato noticed where he was looking.

“Tobirama-sensei, this is Daiki Hatake, one of my teammates.” Hisato said.

Daiki hastily bowed in greeting to the man that ran their village (and, you know, held their very lives in his hands). “I am honoured to meet you Hokage-sama.” he said hastily.

“Likewise.” The man said good-naturedly, looking down at him in amusement. “Did you have much of a plan beyond sitting in that tree and watching us go through katas?”

Daiki shifted uncomfortably. “No. Not really.” He admitted.

“Well, since you were so interested in watching, you might as well stay for the rest of the session.” The Hokage told him. “Unfortunately Hisato is still only learning katas right now, so I can't ask you to join in and spar with him. Maybe at a later date.”

“Um...That's fine.. I'm okay just... watching...” Daiki said awkwardly, flashing a look of desperation towards Hisato.

Luckily it seemed that Hisato caught onto the message to bail Daiki out of his conversation with the most powerful ninja in the village. “Daiki, you can sit under the tree and watch.” he suggested. “I should get back to the katas.”

Instantly Tobirama's attention was off Daiki and back on Hisato. “Start again from the top, seeing as we were interrupted.” He ordered.

Hisato moved into position as Daiki sank thankfully down under the tree, hoping that neither Hisato or the Hokage would notice him for the rest of their training session.

* * *

 

“Hisato?”

“Yeah?” He looked up from the pages of the medical book to give Biwako his undivided attention. It was the least that he could do since she was so generously sharing her precious medical textbooks with him with almost no questions asked.

Biwako set her own book to the side and leaned back against the wall behind them. “Where do you go every afternoon after training?” She asked bluntly.

Hisato blinked, taken aback at the suddenness of the question. Biwako was the type to not care about any mystery that she couldn't solve on her own with her own deduction skills. By this point he'd figured that she'd found out on her own that he's been doing extra training, or she'd just decided not to bother to find out.

“I'm doing extra training.” He told her. “Learning a new taijutsu style.”

Biwako rolled her eyes. “Duh. I knew that.” She waved a hand at him dismissively. “Your fighting style has changed in team practices lately.”

“If you knew, why did you ask?” Hisato sighed, feeling a headache creep up on him. Was Biwako just bored and screwing with him?

“Weren't you listening?” Biwako huffed. “I asked _where_ you go in the afternoons, not _what_ you're doing. How am I supposed to track you down after my shifts to complain about my stupid fellow interns if I can't find you?”

Hisato smothered a laugh. “Oh.” He snorted. “I'm in training ground seven.”

Biwako narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “Isn't that Team Seven's training ground?” She said.

“Yeah.” Hisato said.

“If I turn up there looking for you, am I going to have to deal with the idiot Sarutobi?” Her tone was dark enough to make Hisato frown.

“No. It's just me and Tobirama-sensei in the afternoons. His other students aren't learning any of his taijutsu.” Hisato reassured her.

Biwako didn't react to the revelation that Hisato's taijutsu instructor was the Hokage at all. “So... Hiruzen won't be there?” She confirmed.

“No.” Hisato paused. “Why? Has he done something to you?”

Biwako picked up her book again with a shrug. “Dunno.” She muttered. “But he's gotten kind of annoying recently. It's troublesome.” She went back to reading without any more explanation.

Hisato went back to his own book, turning over his thoughts in his mind carefully. If Sarutobi was being a pain to Biwako, then he'd have to watch out for her a little more. It would be a pain trying to explain to Tobirama-sensei why Hisato's teammate had murdered his favourite student.


	7. Kunai

 The Namikaze clan compound was not the largest or the flashiest section of Konoha, but it was a very nice place to call home nevertheless. Nestled on the edges of the clan district, the compound was neighbours to the Nara clan and a scattering of other small clans that joined the village at the same time. Unlike the vast Nara estate (which included it's own forest for the deer the clan raised), the Namikaze compound was just large enough to house the fifty odd members of the clan in various buildings ranging from family homes to a boarding house, as well as space enough for a spacious communal dojo and training field, a couple of clan craftsman shops, like the clan weapons forge, and a clan meeting house. The place itself was nothing that special, apart from the Namikaze clan crest emblazoned on most of the wooden buildings and the central courtyard with it's fountain.

Hisato's house was located towards the back of the district, almost next door to the clan head's residence, where his grandparents lived. It meant that Hisato had to make his way through almost the whole compound every time he came and went from his house, something that he was actually pretty happy with. His extended family was interesting, and there was always something to see or do each day as he made his way through the neighbourhood.

Today he was stopped on his way home by a shouted greeting from one of his cousins (she was more like a third cousin or something similar, but no one really kept track of things like that, so she was simply a cousin), and he turned back to smile and return the hello.

“'sup Hisato!” Having caught up with him, Amai reached out and ruffled his hair enthusiastically, grinning away. “How's genin life treating ya?”

Hisato shrugged and rolled his eyes as Amai showed no signs of ceasing her assault on his hair. “It's cool. How's things at the forge?”

“Great!” She beamed at him. “The old man has been letting me trade tips with the civilian blacksmiths recently, and I've been learning all sorts from them.”

Hisato noted the slight blush that coloured Amai's cheeks for a split second with interest. “Tips, huh?”

“Yeah, like tricks to improve air flow in the forge, that kind of thing. Namikaze weapon makers haven't really historically made much, so we don't have the kind of experience that some of these civilian blacksmith clans do...” Amai gushed like a girl in love at Hisato, telling him all of the cool things she'd learned from the blacksmiths in the last few weeks. It was highly suspect that most of her 'tips' seemed to come from one blacksmith in particular; a guy named Tetsu, but Hisato decided to leave things be for now. There would be plenty of time to tease Amai about her civilian crush later.

“Anyway, I came over to see when you were planning on coming and seeing me and the old man.” Amai continued, hefting her hands onto her hips and looking at him somewhat disapprovingly. “You've been a genin for three months! When were you planning to come and pick up your kunai?”

Hisato's eyebrows shot upwards. “My kunai?” He repeated curiously. “You mean...?”

Amai rolled her eyes. “Of course!” She exclaimed. “Didn't your Dad or anyone tell you? You're a genin now, so you should be starting to use the clan kunai instead of the standard village blades. Yuuji didn't speak to you? I nagged him to remind you last time he came in to replace his own stock.”

“Nii-san hasn't said anything.” Hisato said sheepishly. “But he's been pretty busy lately doing higher ranked missions, so he must have forgotten. It's not his fault.”

Amai looked at him sceptically. “The way that your family speaks about Yuuji sometimes, I kind of expect him to be able to poop rainbows or something.”

“Rainbows...?” Hisato repeated in confusion.

“Hmmm... maybe not...” Amai said thoughtfully, finger tapping against her chin. “...maybe gold nuggets instead...”

“Gold nuggets?!”

“Wouldn't that be cool? To poop gold nuggets?” Amai said excitedly. “Imagine all the raw materials you could get by bartering off poop!”

“Wouldn't it be painful, you know, to poop metal?” Hisato pointed out, hardly believing that he was having this conversation.

“Huh, I hadn't thought of that.” Amai said seriously, twirling a finger in her dark red hair with a thoughtful look on her face. “Rainbows it is then.”

Sometimes Hisato wondered why anyone would trust his cousin in a forge full of dangerous equipment. She was seriously ditsy at times. It was people like Amai that let outsiders believe that the Namikaze clan did in fact share some ancestral ties with the famously rowdy Uzumaki clan from Whirlpool.

“Anyway, ditch whatever you've got planned tomorrow morning and come to the forge instead.” Amai ordered bossily, forgetting her crazy talk of poop and rainbows for the moment. “The old man and I have to get you fitted out, it's been put off long enough as it is.”

“Um... I have to do missions in the mornings with my team...” Hisato pointed out. “I can't just ditch.”

“D-ranks?” Amai asked.

“Yeah...”

“Ditch 'em.” She said dismissively. “Nobody cares about those baby missions anyway.”

“But my team-” Hisato started.

“Laters Hisato!”

She was gone before he could really protest any further. Hisato just heaved a sigh and turned towards home, mentally composing what to say to Toru-sensei at morning practice tomorrow in order to get out of D-ranks for the day.

* * *

 

“Um... Toru-sensei?” Hisato shifted nervously. Despite weeks of spending time under Toru-sensei's 'command', speaking up when not asked a direct question by the man still made him nervous.

“What is it, Hisato?” Toru-sensei replied instantly, eyes still focussed on Daiki and Biwako as they sparred.

“Uh... I have something to do this morning... clan duties... and so I can't do missions as usual...” Hisato shrunk back, feeling guilty at backing out of the day's D-ranks.

“Clan stuff, huh?” Toru-sensei sighed. “I suppose it can't be helped. Will it take long?”

“I don't know.” Hisato said truthfully. “I don't think so.”

“Will you still be able to come to afternoon training?”

“I should be.” Hisato said firmly.

“I'll let you guys off the hook for missions today then.” Toru-sensei said. “No use in doing those stupid chores if we're short one genin. I make you do them as team work exercises, mainly.”

“Really?” Hisato asked, feeling a little cheated. Even their teacher thought D-ranks were stupid: so why did they keep having to do them?

“Yeah. That and it's funny to watch you guys screw up everyday chores.” Toru-sensei snorted. “You'd think that Daiki would have learned to steer clear of kitchens by this point.”

Hisato thought darkly of yesterday's babysitting mission. Onigiri were not supposed to be black. Hisato was still trying to figure out what Daiki did to burn the rice to a crisp like that. Thank god Biwako had swiped the riceball out of their charge's hands before the toddler could take a bite. The last thing they needed was to accidentally poison the kid they were supposed to be looking after.

“I think Daiki just has way too much fun trying to discover all the different ways he can destroy food to just step aside and let Biwako cook everything, Sensei...” Hisato said dejectedly.

“Well... at least the kitchens of Konoha are all safe for today.” Toru-sensei said wryly. “I'll tell the others you all have the morning off when Biwako stops messing around and grinds Daiki's face into the dirt.”

As if on cue Biwako finally trapped Daiki in her shadow bind jutsu and unceremoniously manipulated her team mate into slamming his head against a nearby tree-tree, promptly knocking the Hatake out. She released the jutsu and let him crumple into the dirt, brushing her own yukata free of dust and turning back to the two of them.

“What are you two whispering about?” She asked cheerfully.

Daiki groaned as he slowly regained consciousness.

* * *

 

He managed to crash breakfast at the Namikaze clan forge, to his extreme embarrassment. Amai and her grandparents were still finishing off the meal when he called on them, and he found himself invited to share tea with them in their home above the smithy and shop. It was hard to remember at times that not everyone started the day as early as he and his team did.

“Man, your teacher sounds like a slave driver!” Amai exclaimed over her own tea cup. “I'm glad I'm a chunin!”

“You were a genin when the clan joined the village though, right?” Hisato said slowly. “Didn't you have teachers telling you what to do?”

Amai pulled a face. “Genin corps teachers weren't exactly the most enthusiastic bunch.” She snorted. “Yuuji probably never complained at home, because he's a complete saint but-”

“Amai-chan isn't, so she's still whining about it, even though she's been a chunin for the past year.” Chiharu-Baa said dryly, setting the teapot back on the table after pouring the last cup for herself.

Amai's cheeks puffed up in indignation. “I'm not _whining_!” She whined. “I'm just pointing out that the genin corps is a stupid, time-wasting, dead end-”

“We get it A-chan.” Ichiro-Jii rumbled. “You didn't like the genin corps.”

Hisato smothered a laugh as Amai just pouted harder in response to her grandparents' teasing. The small family that ran the Namikaze clan forge was very different to his own. Even though Amai was an orphan that wasn't truly related closely to Chiharu-Baa and Ichiro-Jii, the three still functioned as a very close knit family group. It made Hisato a little jealous, if he was being honest. Amai had really lucked out by snagging the aged couple as her foster parents back when she was five. Most foster situations within the clan only lasted until the child was old enough to move into the communal boarding house and fend for themselves. Amai had long since passed the time that most foster children were tossed out into the wild. In fact, she was now being set up to take over the clan forge when Ichiro-Jii got too old to work metal anymore.

“So midget... kunai!” Amai tossed back the remainder of her tea and slammed her cup down onto the table with a grin (and a disapproving glare from her grandmother). “Let's go!” She sprang to her feet with a nearly uncontainable glee.

“Um... right...” Hisato hurriedly finished his own tea (not drinking every drop would be incredibly rude to Chiharu-Baa; her tea was always excellent) and got to his feet before Amai bounced off and left him behind.

“Try not to overwhelm the poor boy.” Ichiro-Jii warned Amai. “Not everyone is as obsessed with sharp things as you: he's just here for the clan kunai.”

Amai rolled her eyes. “I know!” She said, a hint of disappointment in her voice. “But a girl can dream, can't she? One day someone is going to come along who shares my love for all things sharp and deadly!”

Hisato wondered if he should introduce her to Daiki. He certainly had a disturbing love for sharp things too. They could compare records on how many blades they could conceal on their persons. Hisato had no doubt that Amai still packed some serious hidden weaponry, even though she spent most of her time in forges instead of on missions these days.

“Come on!” Amai called out. She was already halfway down the stairs to the forge, looking back at him like he was an idiot. Hisato hurriedly bowed to Chiharu-Baa and Ichiro-Jii, thanking them for the tea, before scurrying after his teenage cousin.

* * *

 

“What do you know about Namikaze clan weaponry?” Amai asked quietly as they moved through the sturdy shelves that made up the forge's weapons stock.

“Not much.” Hisato admitted. “Just what the kids hear around the clan... and I've seen Yuuji's and Father's kunai before.”

Amai nodded seriously. It was strange to see her suddenly so quiet and focussed. The minute they entered the storeroom she went into business mode, shedding her boisterous personality like a coat as she came inside.

“Then you at least know what the clan kunai look like.” She said, stopping at a shelf to take down a box. “Have they let you try them out before?”

“Yuuji has a couple of times.” Hisato said. “But Father doesn't like anyone touching his weapons.”

“Yeah, lots of the older shinobi are like that.” Amai said ruefully. “It's veteran paranoia. Makes servicing their things next to impossible sometimes.” She led Hisato out of the maze of shelves and over to a corner of the room where a large table covered in burns and scratches stood. She gestured him over to the table and began to unpack the contents of the box.

Hisato stared in awe at the collection of blades that Amai placed in front of him.

“This is the clan standard kunai.” Amai pointed to the first blade on the left. Hisato picked up the three pronged blade by it's wooden handle to examine it closer. He was not prepared for the weight, and Amai snorted at the look on his face. “Yeah... it's heavy, isn't it?” She teased. “Three times heavier than the Konoha standard kunai. That's because we don't make 'em for throwing. These are close combat melee kunai. You can parry swords with these.”

Hisato's heart sank a little. He hadn't really thought about it, but of course the clan kunai would be tailor made to compliment the heavy handed Sea-Spray style taijutsu. The heavy blades would be invaluable to gain leverage against opponents using weapons to compliment a close quarters fight, and the sturdiness of the unusual blade would probably smash through standard kunai that most ninja used. That was great... but he was in the process of learning Lightning Step, a style that was almost the exact opposite of Sea-Spray. While heavy weapons would be brilliant in holding ground against an opponent, they would do nothing but slow Hisato down.

“Your Father uses those blades.” Amai continued. “But Yuuji uses these.” She pointed to the next weapon along in the line-up.

Hisato frowned as he put the first kunai down and turned his attention to the next blade. The only discernible difference that he could see between the two weapons was that the firsts wooden handle was stained almost pitch black. The second one was stained a couple of shades lighter, making it instantly recognisable that the handle was made of wood. Gingerly Hisato picked it up, wondering if there was another difference he was missing, but the only other thing he noticed was that this kunai was a smidge less heavy than the first, not by much though.

“Not a big difference, is there?” Amai told him. “But notice it's a little bit lighter. We used a slightly different alloy to make up the blade in this newer version.” She pointed to the blade. “The old man started working on these when we moved to the village. With advice from the civilian blacksmiths, he managed to forge a new blade that keeps it's edge better in heavy combat. It means that our shinobi don't have to replace their blades every time they come back from a mission. Unfortunately the trade off is the blade got lighter, so most of the older generation don't like 'em. It's the newer kids coming through now that use them.” She shrugged. “Yuuji and my generation were the first to use them exclusively, mostly. Some of the older guys adapted... but not many.”

Well, that was a relief... sort of. At least he wouldn't be expected to use the heavier first blade. It sounded like the clan was in the process of phasing the clunkier older blade out. Unfortunately the newer blade wasn't that much lighter. He would have to consult with Tobirama-sensei, but most likely he wouldn't be able to work the clan kunai into his style. He could probably carry a couple as a back-up weapon for sentimentality's sake, but that left a bitter taste in his mouth. He wanted to use the clan kunai like the rest of his family.

“The rest of the blades here are just variety in blade style.” Amai waved her hands over the last three blades. One was missing the two extra prongs on the side, making it resemble a normal kunai. One had a much longer main blade, stretching out to make the kunai seem more like a very short sword than a knife. The last had a different grip to the others, bound in soft leather compared to the wooden hilts of the others. Hisato picked them all up half-heartedly, but they all had similarly heavy weights to them.

“What's wrong?” Amai frowned at him. “Most people are excited to pick out their kunai, ya know?”

“Nothing's wrong.” Hisato forced a smile onto his face, hoping it was enough to fool Amai. He didn't really want any of the clan to find out that he wasn't planning on mastering the Sea-Spray style just yet. He would have to feign excitement over getting the unwieldy heavy weapons and take them to Tobirama-sensei later. If there was a way to work the kunai into Lightning Step, then Tobirama-sensei would surely find it for him.

“Hisato.” Amai said warningly. “Spit it out.”

Damn. She wasn't a fool, no matter what her personality was like at times.

Hisato shifted uncomfortably. “They're too heavy.” He admitted in a quiet voice. “I don't think I can use them.”

“Everyone thinks that at first.” Amai said comfortingly. “But it's easier than you think to get used to the weight. You'll be a pro at using them in no time!”

Hisato gulped. “No. Amai-nee... I don't think I'll _ever_ be able to use them.”

Amai's eyes narrowed. “Did your dad say something again?” she asked.

“No.”

She didn't look convinced. “Just because Uncle Takashi keeps chewing you out for not picking up the clan taijutsu as quick as your brother, that doesn't mean that you're not a good fighter. Yuuji's special, that's all. Stop comparing yourself to him.”

Hisato nodded sadly. “I know.” He said hesitantly. “I have... that's why I don't think I'll be able to use the clan kunai.”

There was a long pause as Amai sighed. “Kid. If you don't stop speaking in riddles, I can't help you.”

Hisato winced, but carefully looked up at Amai from under his bangs. His boisterous cousin had always seemed like the very last person in the clan to entrust with a secret. She was one of the clan members who seemed to be in the thick of everything, with her thumb on the buzzing vein of gossip that ran through the clan. There was a chance that if he fessed up to everything here the whole clan would know of his betrayal by sunset.

But...

Amai looked at him with an even, serious gaze that seemed out of place on her fourteen-year-old face. It was the gaze of someone who was wise beyond their years. Someone who probably knew a lot of secrets already and knew what to keep to herself and what to share. There was also no looking past the fact that her eyes had a spark of sympathy within them, like she really cared about Hisato and his problems... like she wanted to help.

Amai had always been one of his favourite cousins.

“I'll never be good at the Sea-Spray style.” Hisato told her. “I can't use it.”

“Now that's just being pessimistic.” Amai scowled. “I've seen you spar. You're perfectly fine using Sea-Spray!”

“But I'll never master it.” Hisato said darkly. “Not like Father or Yuuji.”

“I told you that you need to stop comparing yourself to Yuuji, didn't I?” Amai said impatiently. “Don't give up! You're only eight, you'll grow!”

“Look at me Amai-nee!” Hisato blurted, spreading his arms wide. “I'm skinny and I barely have any muscle mass...”

“You'll grow.” Amai said stubbornly. “I bet you'll turn out really tall.”

Hisato rolled his eyes. “Yeah... tall and _skinny_.” he pointed out. “Weedy.”

Amai looked at him a little helplessly. “You... still shouldn't give up...” She bleated. Even she couldn't deny that Hisato's growth patterns indicated that he'd never be a stocky Namikaze clansman.

“I haven't.” Hisato voice was calm, but his heart was thudding in his chest. “I've just decided on a different approach.”

“A different approach?” Amai blinked at him curiously. “What do you mean?”

“Toru-sensei set me up with a new teacher who is teaching me a different taijutsu style.” Hisato admitted quietly. “A speed style.”

Amai's eyes widened. “You've switched out your taijutsu style?” She said in a whisper. “Does your dad know?”

Hisato shook his head furiously. “No. And I really want to keep it that way. Please don't tell _anyone_ Amai-nee.” There was an edge of desperation to his voice that Hisato couldn't hide.

She regarded him thoughtfully for a second. “Speed, huh?” She said.

“Yeah. I'm small and fast. It suits me.” Hisato ducked his head in embarrassment. “And Toru-sensei found me a really good teacher.”

“Hmmm?” Amai hummed. “Who is it? You're not learning another clan's taijutsu style, are you? 'Cause that's just a political nightmare waiting to happen.”

Hisato rolled his eyes. “Like anyone would actually teach an outsider their clan style.” He scoffed. “Toru-sensei is good, but he's not that persuasive.”

“You still haven't told me who your teacher suckered into teaching you a taijustu style from scratch.” Amai said dryly. “Spill it! As your cousin I gotta make sure that your Jonin-sensei hasn't foisted you off on a dunce or something.”

Hisato coughed. “Tobirama-sensei is teaching me Lightning Step.”

“Tobirama?” Amai frowned. “That's weird; he's got the same name as the Hokage!”

Hisato coughed again. “That's because Tobirama-sensei _is_ the Hokage....”

Amai froze.

Hisato waited. He figured this would be her reaction.

“The _HOKAGE_ is teaching you his taijutsu style?!” Amai exploded.

“Um... yeah...” Hisato shifted uncomfortably. “But... I would really appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone. I don't really want anyone to know that I've dropped Sea-Spray as my primary combat style.”

Amai just stared at him. “...the _Hokage_...” She repeated faintly. “Well... I suppose I don't have to worry about your new teacher being an idiot, huh?” She turned to stare at the kunai still laid out on the table in front of them, frowning in concentration. “Hokage...” She muttered. “...Lightning Step... Speed...” She hummed the words, lost in thought.

“Amai-nee?” Hisato asked softly. “Uh... are you okay...?”

“I'm just thinking.” She said mildly. “Setting you up with your kunai turned out to be a lot more complicated than I thought it would be.” She grinned ruefully, eyes still fixed on the kunai. “Honestly I thought it would take you five minutes to decide that you'd like the same kunai as Yuuji and we'd be away laughing. This.... is so much more...”

“...annoying.” Hisato finished her sentence for her glumly.

Amai's sharp eyes turned to him in an instant. “Hah?!” She exclaimed. “What do 'ya mean, 'annoying'? This is so much more _exciting!_ ”

Hisato just stared at her. “Huh?”

Amai grabbed his shoulders, eyes sparkling in delight. “Hisato, this means that I have an excuse to play around in the forge!” She said gleefully. “I'm gonna make you the coolest custom job _ever!_ ” She was practically bouncing on her toes in front of him. “How far through the Lightning Step katas are you? Do you think you know what kind of balance you need in a kunai yet? Weight? Will the three prongs be helpful, or unhelpful?” She fired off the questions without pause for breath, and Hisato momentarily forgot to breathe himself.

“Uh...” Hisato gulped a little air in before attempting to answer her questions as best as he could. “I'm pretty far now... Tobirama-sensei said that I'm probably ready to start sparring soon. I don't know about balance and stuff, but the kunai probably needs to be as light as you can make it.. and I don't think the prongs would be _unhelpful_.” He paused. “I'll have to ask Tobirama-sensei.”

Amai leaned back, letting go of his shoulders finally to muse on the information that he'd given her. “Hmmm... yeah. You'd better talk with the Hokage first before we start to make any designs.” She sounded off in dreamland. Hisato started to think that he'd somehow unleashed some sort of monster. He'd never seen her so enthusiastic about anything else before, and that was saying something.

“I have training this afternoon.” Hisato offered. “I can run it past him and drop by the forge tonight to tell you what he thinks.”

“Would you?” Amai gushed. “Wouldn't that be awesome? Forging a custom kunai based on the Nidaime's advice!”

“Just... don't tell anyone...” Hisato said worriedly.

Amai scooped him up in a bone-crushing hug. “Don't worry squirt, it'll be our little secret!” She set him down with a wink. “Now scat. Remember to come back tonight with what your teacher says about the kunai!”

Hisato saluted her and darted from the storeroom, still reeling from her enthusiasm.


	8. Team Seven Enters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ... and Hiruzen makes an idiot of himself.

 Biwako stiffened next to Hisato and ground to a halt, right there in the middle of the path.

“What are _they_ doing here?” She hissed.

Hisato followed her line of sight, peering into training ground five to see who it was that had Biwako wound up as tight as a spring. To be honest, he wasn't that happy that someone had invaded their turf. Training ground five was always _theirs_ to train in after lunch. Nobody else should be using it.

“Don't they have their own training ground?” Daiki frowned in confusion.

Hisato blinked, finally recognising the three children sitting in the middle of the clearing of training ground five. Daiki was right. Hiruzen Sarutobi, Koharu Utatane and Homura Mitokado had their own training ground. Training ground seven was assigned to their genin team as surely as training ground five had been assigned to Team Toru. So what were they doing here?

A large hand fell onto Biwako's head, mussing up her dark hair and making her scowl.

“At ease, team.” Toru-sensei said lightly. “They were invited.”

All three of them turned to stare at Toru-sensei accusingly. Why would he invite another genin team onto their turf?

“Stop looking so betrayed.” Toru-sensei huffed. “We're doing a lesson on genjutsu today, and I promised Tobirama-sama that I'd include his students in our genjutsu lessons to give him some breathing room.”

“Oh.” Hisato said, suddenly remembering the deal between the two teachers that Tobirama-sensei had explained on his first afternoon of Lightning Step lessons.

“Yeah, so no big deal guys!” Toru-sensei said pointedly. “ _Try_ and get along, would you?”

Daiki and Hisato murmured their agreement.

“Biwako.”

“Fine.” The girl in question huffed, crossing her arms. “But if Hiruzen dares to pull my hair even _once_ , I'm sticking a senbon in his hand.”

Toru-sensei shrugged. “Fair enough.” He said. “Nothing teaches a kid to keep his hands to himself like a senbon through the palm. I tell my sisters the same thing.”

Daiki and Hisato exchanged worried looks, and wordlessly came to the same conclusion that they never wanted to formally meet Toru-sensei's little sisters. In fact, they figured it was probably just best to steer clear of the whole Kurama clan. Genjutsu users were famously a little weird. A whole clan of them just didn't bode well for anyone.

Meanwhile, the three sitting in the clearing had finally noticed that the people they were waiting on had arrived, and turned their attention towards them. Homura nodded at them, Koharu waved happily and Hiruzen grinned like his birthday had come early. Hisato couldn't help but notice that the Sarutobi's eyes were firmly fixed on Biwako.

“Twenty ryo that she stabs him sometime in the next ten minutes.” Daiki muttered to Hisato.

“No bet.” Hisato replied dryly.

* * *

 

Hiruzen did well. Twenty minutes into the lesson he shrieked like a toddler and bolted away from Biwako, clutching a bleeding hand. Toru-sensei stopped mid-lecture to fix an amused look on the boy.

“Something wrong?” He asked mildly.

“She stuck me with a senbon!” He flailed the bleeding hand at Toru-sensei accusingly.

The whole group looked to the scowling Biwako, who sat there with her arms crossed, looking totally unapologetic. “What?!” She said irritably. “He pulled my hair! I _said_ I would stab him if he did that!”

Toru-sensei looked back to Hiruzen. “Why did you pull Biwako's hair?”

Hiruzen shrugged and pointedly looked away. “Dunno...” He muttered. “I felt like it.”

Homura and Koharu exchanged a look and sighed heavily. “Ignore him. He's an idiot.” Koharu told them bluntly. Hiruzen shot her a look of pathetic indignation.

“Okay.” Toru-sensei shrugged and resumed the lesson.

* * *

 

“I understand that your teammate put a hole through one of my students yesterday.” Tobirama-sensei said lightly as he corrected Hisato's stance.

Hisato grinned guiltily. “Yeah...” He said. “Is Hiruzen still mad?”

“Oh yes.” Tobirama-sensei said dryly. “I think he wants me to do something about it.”

“Are you?” Hisato asked curiously, shifting out of the stance and then back into it, trying to memorise the adjustments that Tobirama-sensei made.

“Hmph. No.” Tobirama-sensei said. “Saru was asking for it, messing with the Nara girl like that.”

“Biwako does have a bit of a vindictive streak.” Hisato agreed.

“Shame she's a medic.” Tobirama-sensei said. “She'd probably make a good interrogator.”

Hisato stared at him. “An interrogator, really?”

“Tell me that she doesn't get exactly what she wants 90% of the time.” Tobirama-sensei said mildly. “Whether by tricking it out of you or by strong arming you into it.”

Hisato stopped going through his stances abruptly as he thought back on every moment of their shared childhood where Biwako tried to get something she wanted. Tobirama-sensei was right. She always got her way. _Always._

“How did you _know_ that?” Hisato asked in awe. “Even I hadn't noticed!”

Tobirama-sensei shrugged. “I end up reading a lot of progress reports on you young ones.” He explained. “It's not hard to read between the lines sometimes. All of Biwako's teachers have nothing but good things to say about her, even when reporting that she'd refused to do something they wanted her to do. Did you know that she managed to worm her way out of early graduation twice?”

Hisato's eyebrows shot up. “ _Twice?_ ” His heart sank. It was one thing to know that Biwako was a talented kunoichi, it was another to know that she had deliberately put off graduating earlier than their already early graduation at age eight. “Why would she do that?”

Tobirama-sensei shook his head. “I take it that Toru hasn't really taught you much about seeing underneath the underneath yet, huh?”

Hisato flushed. Toru-sensei had mentioned something like that a couple of times, but he hadn't really got what the man was trying to say. Biwako seemed to get it instinctively though, so Hisato figured it was probably something that he was too stupid to get.

“The first time she was offered early graduation, it was when Saru and the others graduated.” Tobirama-sensei explained. “The academy teachers had her tagged for being the kunoichi on my genin team.”

Hisato's mouth fell open. Biwako had given up Tobirama-sensei as a teacher? Did she know? Was she crazy?

“She bowed out of taking the test, pleading that she wanted more time to 'perfect her basics'. The Academy sensei were so flattered that she was taking the basic academy lessons so seriously that they didn't see that she just didn't want to graduate.” Tobirama snorted. “The second time she didn't realise that she was sitting an early graduation exam until she was actually in the room with the test paper in front of her. She deliberately flunked the exam by preforming just below par. Enough that the teachers thought that she'd still tried her hardest, but not high enough to actually pass.” Tobirama-sensei shook his head. “At that point I'd read her file and was trying to get her to graduate early so I could put her in a medical apprenticeship. It wasn't difficult to see what she'd done when I saw the results.”

Hisato suddenly felt like he should apologise for his difficult childhood friend. Clearly she had caused Tobirama-sensei quite a bit of grief.

“Um... Biwako... kind of just does what she likes...” Hisato said apologetically. “I'm sorry...”

“I was beginning to think that I'd have to _order_ her to graduate, but I gave her one last shot with that mass exam.” Tobirama-sensei sighed. “Which, confusingly, she passed with flying colours. No holding back. No excuses. She breezed through the exam and collected her hitai-ate without complaint.”

Hisato frowned. “Why?” Biwako would always be a mystery to him, but maybe Tobirama-sensei had figured her out a little.

“Couldn't work it out either, kid.” Tobirama-sensei huffed. “Damn Naras. Took me forever to figure it out.”

Hisato blinked at him. “What made her change her mind?” He asked curiously.

“You.” Tobirama-sensei said simply. “I looked over the lists. The only time that she willingly passed the exam was when she saw that you got the same chance to graduate. She must have been pretty confident that you'd pass to not hold back on the test like that.”

Hisato felt his brain screech to a halt. “Huh?!” He exclaimed. “Why would she graduate because of me?”

“She wanted to be on a genin team with her best friend.” Tobirama-sensei explained. “She certainly dropped enough subtle hints to the academy teachers over the past year that she wanted to be on the same team.”

His cheeks burned. “I... I didn't graduate... just because you wanted Biwako to... did I?” He asked fearfully. As horrible as it was to think that, Hisato couldn't help but think it was likely that was the case. If the Hokage really was desperate enough for Biwako to graduate, it was probably not a big deal to bump up a less-than-stellar student in order to make that happen.

Tobirama-sensei just gave him a funny look, like he was completely baffled at that train of thought. “No.” He said bluntly. “Why would you think that?”

Hisato ducked his head, avoiding eye contact like he always did when he was nervous. “I'm not exactly... talented...” He trailed off. “Father didn't think that I was ready to graduate early, when I told him that I passed... I'm not as good as my Nii-san... you know...”

There was a long moment of silence. Hisato wondered if he'd said something wrong, and he timidly looked up through his fringe to look at the Hokage again. The man was staring at him blankly.

“Tobirama-sensei...?” Hisato said uncertainly.

“You didn't do it deliberately, did you?” Tobirama voice was tired as he suddenly spoke. “That... explains a lot.”

“Didn't do what deliberately?” Hisato wanted to know.

“You turned down an early graduation too, kid.” Tobirama said dryly. “Didn't you know?”

It was Hisato's turn to stare blankly. “No I didn't.” He said firmly. “I would have remembered something like that!”

“Remember Kazou Shimura?” Tobirama-sensei said.

Hisato blinked. “The special jonin who taught us traps at the academy?” He frowned. “Yeah... what about him?”

“Nii-sama gave him permission to offer you an apprenticeship, back when my team graduated. You turned him down.” Tobirama-sensei said.

“Wha...?” Hisato's mind was reeling. “I don't remember that! He did ask if I wanted to study trap making further... but I said no, because my father wanted me to focus on the clan arts rather than wasting my time with extra lessons... what's so funny?”

Tobirama-sensei was laughing now. “So I was right: you didn't realise. Hisato, Kazou wasn't offering you extra lessons. He was offering you early graduation to study trap-making as a speciality under him.”

That... would certainly explain why the man looked so disappointed when Hisato turned him down. “But... why would he want me as an apprentice?” Hisato blurted. “There were lots of other people that were good at trap-setting. Like Kagami! And Hiruzen was top of the class until he graduated!”

“Yeah, maybe.” Tobirama-sensei was looking at him funny again. “But the one that Kazou was drooling to teach was you.”

“D...drooling?!”

“He told me that you managed to take him out using nothing but a rubber band and a shock tag.” Tobirama-sensei said. “In the _second_ lesson.”

Hisato flushed. “I didn't think it would work so well...” He muttered, feeling the old embarrassment creep up on him again. The prank was meant to be funny! A group of them were bored waiting for their late teacher, so they decided to scrounge up whatever materials they could find in the room to set up traps for him. Hisato wasn't fast enough to get any of the good stuff laying around, like ninja wire or buckets, but Kagami was kind enough to give him a shock tag to go with the rubber band that he found in a desk drawer. When the moment of truth came Kazou-sensei easily sidestepped all of the traps, just like they expected (the man was a special jonin after all), only to trigger the rubber band trap on the teacher's podium as he gloated about their poor trapping skills, getting a shock tag to the gut. The man passed out at the front of the classroom and they had to run for help. Hisato had felt so guilty. “He was just overwhelmed by all of the other traps that mine managed to slip past. Half the class had rigged kunai and buckets of water to fly at him, after all.”

Tobirama-sensei was still giving him that look. “Hisato. You _really_ have no clue, do you?”

“No clue about what?” This conversation was going around in circles, and Hisato was starting to get tired of it. Tobirama-sensei was talking in what seemed like riddles, and he still couldn't figure out why a trap-master wanted him as an apprentice. Kagami would have been a better choice. The amount of things he could do with his clan's ninja wire was impressive.

Tobirama-sensei looked at him long and hard. “Ask Toru.” He said finally.

Hisato huffed a sigh of frustration, but he knew that the conversation was now over. It was time to get back to his taijutsu stances.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...And with that I have officially caught this fic up with the updates on FF.net. From now on expect sporradic updates. This fic is unbeta-ed and has relatively short chapters, so rule of thumb is basically when inspiration strikes me I'll churn out a chapter. I'd love to hear what people think about 'Sparking a Yellow Flash' so far, so drop me a comment if you're feeling generous :)


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